LIBRARY OF COPJQRESS. 



Shelf -..Vi.2-.a.. 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



u 




STAT-UE OF LIN-COLN, IN LIN-COLN PARK, CHIC-A-GO. 



History of Illinois 



N WORDS OF ONE SYLLABLE 







TiBioivdi-^s '^\Kr. IEZu5^3^Tr)P^oi^r)- 



Iprofuscl^ UllustrateD 




NEW YORK, CHICAGO, SAM FRANCISCO 
BELFORI), CLARKE ct CO. 



\% 



COPYRIGHT BV 

BELFORD, CLARKE & CO. 

1888 




D0NOHXJE& Hennebkrry. Printers and Binders, Chicago, 



F5^ 
MX"- 



CONTENTS. 



I. 

II. 

III. 

IV. 

V. 

VI. 

VII. 

VIII. 

IX. 

X. 

XI. 

XII. 

XIII. 

XIV. 

XV. 

XVI. 

XVII. 

XVIII. 

XIX. 

XX. 

XXI. 

XXII. 

XXIII. 

XXIV. 

XXV. 

XXVI. 

XXVII. 

XXVIII. 

XXIX. 

XXX. 

XXXI. 

XXXII. 

XXXIII. 

XXXIV. 



Ear-ly His-to-ry of lU-in-ois, 
The Mound Build-ers, 
In-dians in Ill-in-ois, 



In-dians in 111- 



In-dians in Ill-in-ois — Child-hood and Youth. 



In-dians in 111- 



n-ois — The Fam-i-ly, 



n-ois — Hunt-ing, 



In-dians in Ill-in-ois — War-fare, - - - - - 

In-dians in Ill-in-ois — Re-lig-i-ous Views — Bur-ial of the Dead, 
In-dians in Ill-in-ois — Mis-cel-la-ne-ous, - - - 

First White Men in Ill-in-ois — Mar-quette and Jol-i-et, 
La Salle and Ton-ti, ...... 

Set-tle-ments in Ill-in-ois — Mis-sion Life and Work, 

Ill-in-ois un-der French Rule, - - . . _ 

More In-dian Troub-les — War with the Chic-a-saws, 

The Con-spir-a-cy and Death of Pon-ti-ac, - . . 

Ill-in-ois Be-comes a Brit-ish Prt)V-ince, ... 

George Rog-ers Clarke in Ill-in-ois, - - . . 

Ill-in-ois Part of the North-west Ter-ri-to-ry, 

The Mas-sa-cre at Fort Dear-born, .... 

Ill-in-ois be-comes a State — Pi-o-neer Days, - - - ' 

The Young State Makes Won-der-ful Pro-gress, 
The Black Hawk War, - - . . . 

Shab-bo-na, a Friend-ly In-dian, . . . . 

Stir-ring, Trag-ic Days, - - - - ' - 

Rap-id Strides — 1846-1861, . . _ . . 

The Gath-er-ing Storm — Hon. Steph-en A. Doug-las, 

The War of the Re-bell-ion — A-bra-ham Lin-coln, 

The War of the Re-bell-ion — Grant and Lo-gan, 

Men of Ill-in-ois in the War of the Re-bell-ion, 

Chic-a-go, the Great Mar-vel of Mod-ern Cit-ies, 

The Great Fire of Chic-a-go, . . . . . 

Chic-a-go af-ter the Fire, - . . . - 

Chic-a-go Re-built, ...... 

Re-cent E-vents, _..... 



PAGE, 

7 
10 

13 
17 
28 

30 
36 
43 
49 
57 
67 
72 

79 
90 

95 
103 

107 

115 
121 
127 
136 

139 
142 
144 
149 

152 
156 
165 
173 
178 

183 
192 

197 
203 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Lin-coln's Mon-u-ment, Lin-coln Park, 

Chi-ca go, - - - - Fron-tis-piece. 

Mound in South-ern Ill-inois, - - 12 

Mound Rel-ics, 12 

An Al gon-quin, ----- 15 

An Ir-o-quois, 16 

In-dian En camp-ment on the Mis sis sip pi, 19 



Guarding the Corn, 
Hus-band, M^ife and Daugh ter, 

jPap-poose, - 

Teach ing the " oung I-dea how to Shoot, 
The \ oung In dian Re ceives the Ben-e-dic- 

tion of his Chief, . - . . 

Indian Fish-ing, . - - . - 

In dians Hunt-ing the Buff-a-lo, - 
The In-dian and his Horse, 
The War Dance, - - - . - 
War ri-or Ad-dress ing Braves as They Set 

Out on the War-Path, 
Tak-ing a Scalp ! - . - . - 

Shoo-ting from behind a Tree, 
An In dian Grave, from a Pho to-graph, - 
Bear-ing Wound ed from the Bat tie-field, 
An In-dian Prairie Cem-e-ter-y, - 
In-dians in Coun-cil, - - - - - 
I-tah ! I-tah ! — " Good Be to You," - 
Spec-i-men of In dian Re-cords, 
How Indians Poi-son-ed their Ar-rows, 
"Fare-well! Fare-well!" 
Mar-quette and Jol-i-et descending the 

Mis-sis-sip-pi, . . - - . 

In-dians Play ing Ball on the Ice, 
Churchat Ca ho ki a, - . - . 

Indian Head Rock, Sa-van-na, Ill-'n-ois, 
The Ter-ri-ble Mas-sa-cre of 1729, 
Pon-ti ac, ------ 

Homes Burned and Fam-i-lies Driv en Out 

to Die in the Woods, - - - - 
Bluff on the Mis-sis sip-pi, Sa-van na, III- 

in ois, ------- 

French Sett lets and In-dians Leav-ing III- 

in-ois, ------ 

The City of Peo ri-a, - - - - 



23 
24 
26 
27 

29 
32 
33 
35 
37 

39 
41 
42 
46 

47 
43 

49 
51 
53 
55 
60 

64 
65 
71 

75 
87 
97 



io3 
114 



PAGE. 

Steam-boat on the Mis-sis-sip-pi, - - n6 

View of Fort Dear-born, from the Riv-er, ■ 119 

Fort Dear-born, E-rec-ted 1S04, - - 122 

Doug-las Mon u ment, Chi ca go, - - 125 

An Em-i-grant Train Cross-ingthe Prair-ie, 129 

Freight Train - 130 

Stage Coach of the Old Days, - - 131 

Fac ing a Prair-ic Storm, - - - - 132 

The Pi-o-neer Farm er, Fif-ty Years A-go, 134 

A Prair-ie Har-vest Field in 1888, - - 135 

School House of the Pi-o-neer Days, - 137 

Black Hawk, ------ 141 

Shabbo-na, ------ 1^3 

Chic a-go in 1833, ----- i_j5 

State House, Spring-field, - - - 147 

U-ni ted States Ar-sen-al, Rock Is-land, - 151 

The Hon. Steph-en A. Doug-las, - - 153 

A-bra ham Lincoln, ----- 157 

Ear-ly Home of A-bra-ham Lin-coln, - 158 
" Boys, Abe Lin-coln is the Best Fel-low in 

This Set-tle-ment," - - . - 160 

Lincoln's Home in Springfield, - - 161 

The Lincoln Mon-u-ment, at Spring-field, 163 

U. S. Grant, - 162 

Gen-er al John A. Lo-gan, - - - 16S 
Gen-er al John A. Lo-gan at the Bat tie of 

At-lanta, - - . . . jyj 

Scene in Lin coin Park, Chic-a-go, - 175 

The Little Pap-poose in Dan-ger, - - iSi 
De-pot of the Chic-ago and North Western 

Rail way, Chic-a-go, - - - - 1S5 

Map of the Burnt Dis-trict of Chic ago, - 1S6 

Scene in Chic-a-go the Day af-ter the Fire, 189 

Post Office, Chic-ago, - - - 191 

Scene on the Chic a go River, - - - 193 

State Street, Chic-a-go, Look-ing South, 195 

Gar-field Park, Chic-a-go, - - - - rgS 

Board of Trade, Chic a-go, - - - 199 

A-cade-my of Fine Arts, Chic-a-go, - - 200 

Rush Med-i-cal College, Chic-a go, - 201 

Ex-po-si-tion Build-ing, Chic-a-go, - - 202 

Wash-ing ton Park Club House, Chicago, 204 

Grand Trunk De-pot, Polk St., Chic-a-go, - 205 




CHAPTER I. 



EAR-LY HIS-TO-RY OF ILL-IN-OIS. 

The State of Ill-in-ois has been 
beau-ti-ful-ly des-cribed as "The 
E-den of the New World." Its 
ear-ly his-to-ry is al-most en-tire-ly 
lost in the mists of long for-got-ten 
years. Great schol-ars, whose lives 
have been de-vot-ed to the stud-y of 
an-cient his-to-ry, have found, scat- 
ter-ed all over Cen-tral and North 
A-mer-i-ca, ru-ins of tem-ples and 
pal-a-ces; por-tions of brok-en col- 
umns and crumb-ling walls; rel-ics 
of pub-lie build-ings and pri-vate 
houses, in such num-bers, and of so 
vast a size, that they have been led 
to think, as the re-sult of the most 
care-ful re-search, that A-mer-i-ca 



S HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

was the home of a won-der-ful civ-il-i-za-tion, 
man-y, man-y a-ges a-go ; and that, in-stead of call- 
ing A-mer-i-ca "The New World," it should 
more prop-er-ly be call-ed "The Old World." 

These learn-ed men be-lieve that m man-y pla- 
ces where rel-ics are found, cit-ies of great size and 
mag-nif-i-cence flour-ish-ed long be-fore the found- 
a-tions of Baal-bec, or Pal-my-ra, or Thebes, were 
laid. It is won-der-ful to think that long be-fore 
Rome was built, or the Pyr-a-mids reared their 
lof-ty heads by the banks of the Nile, there may 
have been densely crowded cit-ies all over this 
fair land; and that on the fruit-ful plains of Ill-in- 
ois, men and wo-men, by thou-sands, liv-ed and 
lov-ed, suf-fer-ed and died, of whose existence 
there is scarce-ly the faint-est trace. All this 
seems ver-y strange ; but the men who tell us these 
thinofs are much too wise and care-ful to make 

<z> 

such state-men ts with-out good rea-son. 

Whence these first in-hab-i-tants of America 
came from we shall prob-a-bly nev-er know. Some 
think they came from A-sia by way of Beh-ring 
Strait. Oth-ers cher-ish a tra-cli-tion, still main- 
tain-ed in Chi-na, to the ef-fect that a com-pa-ny 
of sail-ors, driv-en off shore by west-er-ly winds, 
sail-ed man-y weeks, un-til they came to a great 
con-ti-nent, where the al-oe and kin-dred plants,. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 9- 

were found to flour-ish in great a-bun-dance. 
These plants we re-cog-nize at once as na-tives of 
Mex-I-co. It is not im-pos-si-ble that Greek or 
Phoe-ni-cian sail-ors may have cross-ed the At- 
lan-tic in those ear-ly years; but if they did, they 
nev-er re-turn-ed to tell the sto-ry of their strange 
ad-ven-tures. The Ir-o-quois In-dians have a 
le-gend on this sub-ject, point-ing to the very be- 
gin-ning of the hu-man race. Ac-cord-ing to this 
le-gend Ta-rhu-hia-wa-ka, the Sky-hold-er, re- 
solv-ed up-on the cre-a-tion of a race which should 
sur-pass all oth-ers in the qual-i-ties of strength, 
beau-ty and bra-ver-y. So, from the bo-som of a 
great is-land, where they had for man-y a-ges be- 
fore liv-ed on moles, the Sky-hold-er brought in-to 
the day-light six per-fect-ly mat-ed coup-les, who 
were set a-part as the an-ces-tors of the great-est 
of all peo-ples. That A-mer-i-ca is the old-est of 
ex-ist-ing lands man-y em-i-nent ge-ol-o-gists con- 
fi-dent-ly as-sert. Af-ter all our re-search in this 
di-rec-tion we gain but lit-tle, and noth-ing ver-y 
cer-tain-ly; we shall have to be con-tent to leave the 
first pag-es of A-mer-i-can his-to-ry con-ceal-ed in 
mys-ter-y. We shall nev-er know much a-bout 
the first A-mer-i-cans. 



10 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



CHAPTER II. 

THE MOUND BUILD-ERS. 

Long af-ter the an-cient race, re-ferr-ed to in 
the last chap-ter, had pass-ed a-way ; and long be- 
fore the In-dian had pitch-ed his wig-wam in the 
for-est, or float-ed his birch-bark ca-noe on the 
wa-ters of the riv-ers and the great lakes, a sec- 
ond race of peo-ple known as the Mound Build- 
ers, in-hab-it-ed large por-tions of Cen-tral and 
North A-mer-i-ca. This re-mark-a-ble race has 
left no sto-ries, no le-gends, no tra-di-tions, not 
a sin-gle word of its lan-guage, to guide us to 
a know-ledge of its ways of liv-ing. These 
Mounds on-ly re-main to give us hints ra-ther than 
to tell us what we de-sire to know of their build- 
ers. These mounds are banks of earth, thrown up 
and grass-ed over, form-ing earth-works or em-bank- 
ments, of-ten of an im-mense size. There are 
thou-sands of these mounds still in ex-ist-ence, 
man-y of them o-ver nine-ty feet in height, and a 
hun-dred feet in di-am-e-ter at the base. A long 
chain of these re-mark-a-ble build-in^s was dis- 
cov-er-ed, be-gin-ning at Black river on the south 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. n 

side ot Lake On-ta-rl-o ex-tend-ing through O-hi-o, 
all a-long the Mis-sis-sip-pi to the Gulf of Mex-i- 
co. One of these mounds, in Ad-ams coun-ty, 
O-hi-o, rep-re-sents an e-nor-mous ser-pent looo 
feet long, which ap-pears to be a-bout to swal-low 
an egg-shap-ed fig-ure 164 feet long. The pres- 
ent site of Mar-i-et-ta, O-hi-o, is sup-pos-ed to 
have been one of the larg-est vil-la-ges e-rect-ed by 
these cu-ri-ous build-ers, hav-ing, it is be-liev-ed, 
at a ver-y re-mote pe-ri-od, a pop-u-la-tion of not 
less than 5,000 peo-ple. A-long the Mis-sis-sip-pi 
val-ley more than 3,000 of these mounds have 
been dis-cov-er-ed, man-y of them were found in 
North-ern and West-ern Ill-in-ois. At Ca-ho-kia, 
just op-po-site St. Lou-is, there are dis-tinct tra-ces 
of two of these homes of the an-cient Mound 
Build-ers. One of these mounds is 800 yards in 
cir-cum-fer-ence at the base, and 100 feet in height. 
The larg-est of these mounds is known as Monk's 
Mound, from the fact that the Monks of La 
Trappe set-tied on and a-round it. The top of 
this mound con-tains more than three a-cres of land. 
Some years a-go, in mak-ing an ex-ca-va-tion 
for an ice-house on the north-west part of Monk's 
Mound, hu-man bones and white pot-ter-y were 
found in large quan-ti-ties. This whole re-gion 
of the A-mer-i-can Bot-tom, in the neigh-bor- 



12 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 







h 



"^ hood of Ca-ho- 
^ kia, em-bra- 
1 cingpartof the 
west-ern bor- 
der of Mad-i- 
son and St. 
Clair coun- 
ties, shows the 
r e - m a i n s of 
from 60 to 80 
mounds. These mounds are of ev-er-y 
size and form, con-sist-ing of the re- 
mains of vil-la-ges, al-tars, tem-ples, i-dols, 
cem-e-ter-ies, camps, for-ti-fi-ca-tions, and 
pleas-ure grounds, as well as pri-vate 
With-in them were of-ten found, a-mongst 
oth-er rel-ics, the tools of work-men — knives, chis- 
els, ax-es — some of them of flint and some of cop- 
per. Be-side these tools for the workmen of that 
ear-ly day, 
the mounds 
con-tained a 
great quan- 
ti-ty of carv- 
ed work, — 
beads, pipes 
and brace- 



^)'^>>>^ 



lomes. 




MOUND RE-LICS. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. ij 

lets, vas-es, pitch-ers, and ves-sels of the most 
beau-ti-ful work-man-ship. 

The mounds were gen-er-al-ly built in a sit-u- 
a-tion af-ford-ing a view of the east. When, as 
was some-times the case, they were in-clos-ed in 
walls, the gate-ways were al-ways made to face 
the east. And the graves of these an-cient peo- 
ple were al-ways so sit-u-a-ted that their por-tals 
o-pen-ed to the ris-ing sun. 

Like their ear-li-er un-known an-ces-tors, the 
Mound Build-ers al-so, have pass=ed a-way. The 
names of their might-y men; the ex-ploits and ad- 
ven-tures in which they engag-ed; the ver-y lan- 
guage they spoke, all a-like are bur-ied in the 
graves where their bones mould-er-ed to dust 
man-y cen-tu-ries a-go. 



CHAPTER III. 

IN-DIANS IN ILL-IN-OIS. 



The or-i-gin of the In-dian tribes, the third 
dis-tinct race m-hab-it-ing North A-mer-i-ca, is re- 
ferr-ed by some to the Phoe-ni-cians and oth-er 
mar-i-tmie na-tions, whose ex-ten-sive voy-a-ges 



14 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

must have borne them at va-ri-ous times, to the 
shores of ev-er-y land known and un-ex-plor-ed. 
Some im-ag-ine that the an-cient Hin-doos were 
the fa-thers of this dusk-y race, and in sup-port of 
their the-o-ry they point out that the Hin-doo 
i-dea that makes the sun a sym-bol of the Cre-a- 
tor of the Un-i-verse has its ex-act coun-ter-part 
in the Sun wor-ship of the In-dians. Oth-ers, 
a-gain, with e-qual rea-son, look up-on the In- 
dians as the fast wan-ing rem-nant of the "lost 
tribes of Is-ra-el," who "took coun-sel to ^o forth 
in-to a far-ther coun-try where nev-er man-kind 
dwelt." 

The ex-act place of the or-i-gin of the In-dian 
tribes will prob-a-bly nev-er be known; but the all 
but u-ni-ver-sal judg-ment of those who have made 
a care-ful stud-y of this sub-ject, is that their or-i- 
gin was in the sun-ny, smil-ing O-ri-ent, in some 
part of A-sia, from which they mi-gra-ted thous- 
ands of years a-go to the path-less wilds of A-mer- 
i-ca. For man-y cen-tu-ries the In-dians must 
have en-joy-ed a per-fect-ly un-dis-turb-ed oc-cu-pa- 
tion of the land. When the flow of em-i-gra-tion 
from Eu-rope and the East-ern World set in, the 
In-dian turn-eel his face to the West. He be-liev- 
ed that his fa-thers had come from the West, and 
he thought that in that bound-less realm be-yond 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



15 



the Al-le-ghe-nies he would find 
his hap-p3^ hunt-ing ground. 

It would be im-pos-si-ble, m 
the lim-its of one brief vol-ume, 
to deal with the va-ri-ous tribes 
of Indians who dwelt in North 
A-mer-i-ca, and indeed, ourbus-i- 
ness is main-ly with those spe- 
cial-ly as-so-ci-a-ted with the his- 
to-ry of Ill-in-ois. 

The on-ly great branch-es of 
the In-dian race claim-inor our 
con-sid-er-a-tion in this stud-y of 
the his-to-ry of the great Prair-ie 
State are the Al-gon-quins and 
the Ir-o-quois. The Al-gon-quins es-pec-ial-ly, had 
spread far and wide o-ver the land. Car-tier found 
them on the banks of the St. Law-rence. When 
the Pu-ri-tans came they found them fish-ing and 
hunt-ing all a-long the At-lan-tic coast from Maine 
to the Car-o-li-nas. They were tribes of the Al- 
gon-quins whom the French mis-sion-a-ries first 
found on the banks of the Mis-sis-sip-pi and the 
Ill-m-ois riv-ers. 

The Ir-o-quois had a con-fed-er-a-cy con-sist-ing 
of five tribes — the Mo-hawks, the O-nei-das, the 
O-non-da-gas, the Ca-yu-gas, and the Sen-e-cas, 




j6 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



to which a sixth, the Tus-ca-ro-ras, was af-ter- 
wards add-ed. Each tribe had a sep-a-rate po-ht- 
i-cal or-gan-i-za-tion in which the Sach-ems were 
the rul-ing spir-its. When for-eign tribes were to 
be con-sult-ed, or the gen-er-al in-ter-ests of the 
con-fed-er-a-cy re-quir-ed de-Hb-er-a-tion, the Sach- 
ems of the sev-er-al tribes met in gen-er-al coun-cil. 
The Ir-o-quois were, with-out doubt, em-i-nent- 
ly suc-cess-ful in war, but that suc-cess was due 
ver-y large-ly to lo-cal and oth-er ad-van-ta-ges. 
They were el-o-quent, full of shrewd wis-dom, far- 
see-ing and cour-a-geous. But the Al-gon-quin 
tribes of the same re-gion of coun-try were in all 
re-spects their e-quals. As time went on these 
great ri-val fac-tions be-came more and more u-ni- 
ted by what may be re-gard-ed as the strange ac- 
ci-dent of war. The Ir-o-quois, 
for ex-am-ple, would re-pair their 
con-stant loss-es in war by a-dopt- 
ing the wo-men and chil-dren cap- 
tured from their Al-gon-quin en-e- 
mies. This course of ac-tion had 
the most de-si-ra-ble re-sults. Old 
feuds and quar-rels were heal-ed, **^-^'^^«^^^ A,' /X/^ 
and the time came when a good-ly 
number of the a-dopt-ed Al-gon- 
quins be-came prom-i-nent chiefs 




AN IR-O-QUOIS, 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. ly 

of the Ir-0-quois. Of the tribes of the Al-gon- 
quins who for-mer-ly dwelt in lU-in-ois, those bear- 
ing the name of the State were the most nu-mer- 
ous. The Ill-in-ois Con-fed-er-a-cywascom-pos-ed 
of five tribes — the Tam-a-ro-as, the Mich-i-gan-ies, 
the Kas-kas-ki-as, the Ca-ho-ki-as, and the Pe-o- 
ri-as. 



CHAPTER IV. 

IN-DIANS OF ILL-IN-OIS LIFE AND MAN-NERS. THE 

FAM-I-LY. 

Any his-to-ry of Ill-in-ois that fails to por-tray, 
how-ev-er brief-ly, the life and man-ners, the modes 
and hab-its of the In-dians who dwelt in this State 
be-fore the com-ing of the white man, would be 
man-i-fest-ly in-com-plete. We shall, there-fore, 
de-vote three or four short chap-ters to this sub- 
ject. We shall look in at the wig-wam and note 
the char-ac-ter-is-tics of the fam-i-ly life of the In- 
dian. We shall fol-low him in his hunt-ing ex-pe- 
di-tions and his gen-er-al a-muse-ments. We shall 
note his tac-tics in war, his no-tions of re-li-gion, 
his strange meth-ods of burial, and his im-per-ish- 
a-ble hope that if he is faithful to his tribe and 



1 8 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

val-iant in war, he and his faith-ful dog will roam 
for-ev-er through the hap-py hunt-ing grounds. 

The homes of the In-dian were of the sim-plest 
and rud-est char-ac-ter. They gen-er-al-ly se-Iect- 
ed the bank of a stream, or a well-shad-ed spot 
near some ev-er run-ning spring, as the site of 
their hab-it-a-tion. There they pitch-ed their wig- 
wams, which were com-pos-ed, not of mar-ble or 
brown stone, or even of good, use-ful lum-ber, but 
of poles and the bark of trees. They were so con- 
struct-ed that they could eas-i-ly be ta-ken down. 
It is per-fect-ly won-der-ful with what speed a 
whole In-dian en-camp-ment could move a-way 
from a giv-en spot, leav-ing on-ly the faint-est trace 
of ev-er hav-ing oc-cu-pied it. 

The homes of the great Sach-ems, or chiefs, 
were some-times of a more e-lab-o-rate char-ac-ter, 
be-ing con-struct-ed with great-er care, but of the 
same ma-te-ri-al. 

The Ir-o-quois In-dians had some rough no- 
tions of com-mun-ism in those ear-ly days. They 
built not for one fam-i-ly, but man-y. These 
dwell-inofs were call-ed the " Lono; House" — a 
wig-wam, oft-en 250 feet long and 30 feet wide, 
ca-pa-ble of hold-ing twen-ty to thir-ty fam-i-lies. 

All that was ne-ces-sa-ry toan In-dian mar-ri-age 
was the con-sent of the part-ties con-cern-ed, and 




IN-DIAN EN-CAMP-MENT ON THE MIS-SIS-SIP-PI. 



19 



20 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

of their pa-rents. Mar-ri-age was to a large ex- 
tent a bar-gain, the hus-band giv-ing nu-mer-ous 
pres-ents to the fa-ther of the bride. The hus- 
band might at an-y time dis-solve this tie. 

The In-dians had an in-sti-tu-tion known as 
To-tem, a sort of badge or em-blem of dis-tinc-tion 
of dif-fer-ent clans or tribes. This was, in-deed, 
a kind of caste; a strange, per-ni-cious sys-tem, 
which e-ven our la-test A-mer-i-can civ-il-i-za-tion 
seems to fos-ter ra-ther than de-stroy. These va- 
ri-ous clans had, for their sign's or sur-names, some 
an-i-mal, bird, or oth-er ob-ject, such as the bear, 
the wolf, the ot-ter and the ea-gle. A Bear could 
not mar-ry a Bear, but might take a wife from the 
Wolf, or Ot-ter, or Ea-gle clan. 

In these ear-ly days the red man was the war- 
ri-or, the he-ro, the hunts-man, and his squaw was 
his slave. The men did what pleas-ed them, and 
the wo-men did all the drudg-er-y. 

The il-lus-tra-tion on the next page, of ''The 
In-dian at Home," gives a ver-y good i-dea of the 
con-di-tion of af-fairs. The lords of cre-a-tion are 
read-y with spear and gun, with bow and ar-row, 
to go forth fish-ing or hunt-ing, as their fan-cy may 
sug-gest; or to bat-tie, if the war-whoop has sound- 
ed in their ears. The birch-bark ca-noe toss-es 
I-dly on the wa-ters, a-wait-ing their lord-ly will. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 21 

On the right, the boys of the fam-i-ly are prac-tis- 
ing with bow and ar-row, for they have long a-go 
been taught that an In-dian who is not a skill-ful 




THE IN-DIAN AT HOME. 



marks-man is a shame to his wig-wam, and a dis- 
grace to his tribe. A-way to the left the wo-men 
of the wig-wam are wash-ing, hoe-ing corn, and 
with-in the wig-wams oth-ers are doubt-less cook- 
ing and keeping a-live the fires that were so pre- 
cious to the In-dian heart. 

Al-most the en-tire la-bor and drudg-er-y fell 
upon the wo-men. They had to plant the crops, 
tend the crops, and gath-er the crops. The hard- 
est work the men could be per-suad-ed to do in 



22 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

con-nec-tion with the work of the field, was to 
spend the hours of day-hght on a rude plat-form 
e-rect-ed on poles twelve or fif-teen feet high, ratt- 
ling to-geth-er nois-y clap-pers to scare a-way the 
birds from the ri-pen-ing corn. So, for a few 
weeks just be-fore har-vest, he was con-tent to be 
a living "scare-crow," or to speak more po-lite-ly, 
"a guard-i-an of the corn." 

Be-side the or-di-na-ry work of the wig-wam, 
and the cul-ti-va-tion of the crops, by these In- 
dian wo-men, they found time to make bas-kets, 
mats, and frill-ings and oth-er a-dorn-ments for 
their brave war-rior lords. 

There can be noth-ing but con-dem-na-tion for 
this shame-ful deg-ra-da-tion of wo-men a-mong 
the tribes of the ear-ly In-dians; and yet, af-ter a 
care-ful stud-y of the whole sub-ject, it is al-most 
cer-tain that the wo-men did not re-gard them- 
selves as in any great sense the vic-tims of op-pres- 
sion. 

We must not for-get that to see her fa-ther, her 
bro-ther, her lov-er, her hus-band, or her son, a 
brave and daunt-less war-ri-or, was the high-est 
am-bi-tion of an In-dian wo-man. The dusk-y 
In-dian bride might be ver-y proud of the glass- 
bead or-na-ments her bride-groom gave her at the 
wecl-dine feast, but her heart was stir-red to a loft- 




GUARD-ING THE CORN. 



23 



24 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



i-er pride if she could count a good-ly num-ber of 
scalps dang-ling at her bride-groom's gir-dle. A 
cow-ard, a man who was ''a-fraid," had no chance 

with an In-dian 
maid-en. She would 
not work for him, or 
o-bey him. But a 
war-ri-or, a he-ro, she 
a-dor-ed, and would 
ac-count it a last-ine 
dis-grace to her-self, 
if she should al-low 
him to do any com- 
mon work. 

The drudg-er-y of 

HUS-BAND, WIPE AND DAUGH-TER. M i U - n C - ha- h a WaS 

her choice, not her in-ev-it-a-ble fate. Hi-a-wa-tha 
must be a he-ro, with the ea-gle's feath-er in his 
plume, a ter-ror to his foes, the en-vy of his clans- 
men, and the glo-ry of his bride ! And for him to 
plant corn, to hew wood, to car-ry wa-ter, was out 
of all ques-tion. He was too god-like, toohe-ro-ic, 
for such me-ni-al tasks. 

And it may be said that in man-y in-stan-ces 
this de-vo-tion on the part of the wo-men was not 
for-got-ten. Doubt-less there was of-ten much 
kind-ness, and e-ven love, if but lit-tle gen-tle-ness, 




' HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 25 

in these wig-wams that fring-ed the banks of the 
riv-ers of North-ern and South-ern and West-ern 
Ill-in-ois, cen-tu-ries a-go. Man-y pleas-ant sto- 
ries in sup-port of this be-hef are hand-ed down 
from most trust-worthy au-thor-i-ties. A sto-ry is 
told, for ex-am-ple, of an In-dian who trav-el-ed 
for-ty miles to ob-tain some cran-ber-ries for his 
sick wife, who, in the ag-o-nies of fe-ver, had ask-ed 
for some of this fruit. On an-oth-er oc-ca-sion, 
when corn had grown scarce and fam-ine was star- 
ing a fam-i-ly in the face, a war-ri-or chief rode a 
hun-dred miles to get corn. And when he could 
on-ly get half a bush-el of corn in ex-change for his 
horse, he sold the horse and walk-ed home with 
the cov-et-ed prize. And the beau-ti-ful sto-ry of 
'' Hi-a-wa-tha" owes its ro-mance and charm to 
Hi-a-wa-tha's death-less love and de-vo-tion to 
Min-ne-ha-ha. 



CHAP-TER V. 

IN-DIANS OF ILL-IN-OIS LIFE AND MAN-NERS CHILD- 
HOOD AND YOUTH. 

At first sight it would seem as if the In-dian 
child was born to en-dur-ance and hard-ships. 
The lit-tle pap-poose has hard-ly made his ac- 



26 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS, 



quaint-ance with this strange world be-fore his 
first rough les-son is taught. Strap-ped to a flat 
piece of wood the ht-tle stran-ger takes his first 

views of hfe in a pos-ture that one 
would think must be ver-y pain- 
ful. He is sus-pend-ed from a 
tree, or se-cur-ed by straps to the 
back of his hard work-ing moth- 
er, just as the con-ven-ience of the 
hour sug-gests. 

And yet we must not im-ag-ine 
that the In-dian mother was lack- 
ing in ten-der-ness for her young. 
The lit-tle red ba-by was, in the 
great ma-jor-i-ty of in.-stan-ces, as 
fondly nur-tur-ed.and as ten-der-ly 
cared for, as the pet-ted dar-lings 
of most of the civ-il-ized homes of to-day. 

The lit-tle In-dian's hard board cra-dle was 
made com-fort-a-ble with soft dress-ed buck-skin, 
and fra-grant with the sweet-smell-ing grass-es, and 
rib-bons of the bark of the bass and the lin-den 
trees. The finest bead-work that the moth-er could 
make was none too fine for the a-dorn-ment of her 
ba-by's rude cra-dle. And deft-ly plait-ed reed 
splints, and cun-ning-ly plait-ed grass, made pic-tur- 
esque and beau-ti-ful the bed of the for-est child. 




PAP-POOSE. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



27 



Once a day the smil-ing lit-tle pris-on-er was 
re-leas-ed from his bonds, and was al-low-ed to 
roll and play on a blank-et on the grass. This 




TEACH-ING THE YOUNG I-DEA HOW TO SHOOT. 

was the hap-pi-est hour of the day for moth-er and 
for child. But when the hour end-ed, and work 
had to be done, then board and ba-by were strap- 



28 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

ped to-geth-er and hung up-on the near-est tree, or 
plac-ed in an e-rect po-si-tion in some con-ven-i-ent 
cor-ner of wig-wam or lodge. At two years of age 
this bond-age end-ed, and then, ac-cord-ing as the 
child was boy or girl, the real train-ing be-gan. 

The girl was train-ed to drudg-er-y. When 
she was four or five years old she was taught to go 
for wood and car-ry wa-ter. When she was eight 
years of age she was in-struct-ed how to make up 
a pack, and car-ry a small one on her back. As 
she grew old-er she learn-ed to cut wood, to cul-ti- 
vate corn, to cook, to wash, and to dis-charge all 
the oth-er tasks that went to make up an In-dian 
wo-man's work. 

The train-ing of the In-dian boy was whol-ly 
dif-fer-ent. He was to be a war-ri-or, and all his 
ear-ly ed-u-ca-tion was di-rect-ed to that end. He 
was ex-cus-ed from all work. He was al-low-ed 
to run wild. He learn-ed to run, to jump, to swim, 
to wres-tle. He be-came by these ex-er-ci-ses a 
young ath-lete, his phys-i-cal de-vel-op-ment was 
al-most per-fect. 

He was scarce-ly ev-er pun-ish-ed for dis-o-be- 
di-ence. It was thought a most hu-mil-i-a-ting 
thing to lay the rod up-on the should-ers of one 
who was to be a val-iant war-ri-or. 

At a ver-y ear-ly age boys were put to arch- 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



29 



er-y prac-tice. At first with blunt-ed ar-rows, 
shoot-ing at a tar-get of hay bunch-ed at the top 
of a stick, or at the birds that swarm-ed a-bout the 
for-est and the 
prair-ie, or at a 
liv-ing squir- 
rel held up at a 
dis-tance. 

When the 
boy was a-bout 
sev-en years 
old, his first se- 
ri-ous les-sons 
were taught. 
He was call-ed 
up-on to make 
an all-day's 
watch and fast 
on some high 
peak, when 
smear-ed with 
white clay he call-ed up-on his se-lect-ed God or 
man-i-tou to make him a great and vic-to-ri-ous 
w^ar-ri-or. These fasts and watch-ings in-creas-ed 
in num-ber and se-ver-i-ty for eight or nine years. 
When at last these years of pre-par-a-tion were end- 
ed, he re-ceived the ben-e-dic-tion of the chief of 




THE YOUNG IN-DIAN RE-CEIVES THE BEN-E-DIC-TION OF 
HIS CHIEF. 



JO HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

his tribe, and thus start-ed forth up-on his ca-reer of 
man-hood. 

But he had no loft-y dream of hfe. Su-per-sti- 
tion, sor-cer-y, cru-el-ty, a lax mo-ral-ity, and a re- 
morse-less spir-it of re-venge form-ed the chief stock 
in trade of the young In-dian as he start-ed forth 
in life. 



CHAP-TER VI. 

IN-DIANS IN ILL-IN-OIS LIFE AND MAN-NERS HUNT- 
ING. 

Hunt-ing had for the In-dian a thou-sand 
name-less charms. It sup-pli-ed his slug-gish 
mind with ar-dor and in-ter-est. It was some- 
thing to be done, with an end to be gained. It 
was oc-cu-pa-tion with a pur-pose. To be a dis- 
tin-guish-ed hunts-man, a man whose ar-row nev-er 
miss-ed its mark, was some-thing to be proud of. 

The for-est, the prair-ies, and the wild glens, 
were made for him to hunt in. Hunt-inor y\o\. on- 
ly sup-pli-ed the In-dian and his fam-i-ly with food, 
but it o-pen-ed the door to the on-ly kmcl of dis- 
tinc-tion he cared for, with per-haps the sin-gle 
€x-cep-tion of war. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. ji 

Suc-cess in kill-ing large an-i-mals re-quir-ed 
great skill and long years of prac-tice; but the In- 
dian nev-er be-grudg-ed the time it re-quir-ed. 
He was dog-ged, pa-tient, and per-sist-ent. The 
maz-es of the for-est, and the dense tall grass of 
the prair-ies, were the best fields for the ex-er-cise 
of his skill. He would search with most mi-nute 
scru-ti-ny for the faint-est in-di-ca-tion of the foot- 
prints of birds or wild an-i-mals, and then would 
wait and watch, or fol-low the trail, as though his 
whole life de-pend-ed on the re-sult. 

In a for-est coun-try he se-lect-ed for his pla- 
ces of am-bush, val-leys, be-cause they were most 
fre-quent-ly the re-sort of game. He would start 
forth at the first peep of day, and with stealth-y 
steps, wan-der a-long the side of the stream which 
threw his shad-ow from it, thus leav-ing his view 
un-ob-struct-ed in the op-po-site di-rec-tion. 

The most eas-i-ly ta-ken of all the an-i-mals of 
the chase was the deer. Its nat-ur-al cu-ri-os-i-ty 
prompted it to stop in its flight and look back at the 
ap-proach-ing hunt-er. The an-te-lope of the 
Rock-ies of to-day has just the same cu-ri-os-i-ty. 
Hence, all the hunt-er has to do, is to run a large 
white flag up a flag-pole twelve or fif-teen feet high, 
and lie qui-et-ly at the foot of the pole till the in- 
ves-ti-ga-ting an-i-mal draws near. 



J2 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



The In-dians had a ra-ther in-gen-i-ous meth-od 
of tak-ine the deer on the small trib-u-ta-ries of the 
Mis-sis-sip-pi, by the use of the torch. For this 
pur-pose they con-struct-ed their bark ca-noes with 
a place in front for the re-cep-tion of a large flam- 
beau, whose light was pre-vent-ed from re-veal-ing 
the hunt-er by the in-ter-po-si-tion of a screen. 
As he de-scend-ed the nar-row streams, the deer 
see-ing on-ly the light, was at-tract-ed by it to the 
banks and eas-i-ly shot. 

In fish-ing, the In-dian was e-qual-ly ex-pert. 
He had all the pa-tience the fish-er-man so much 

re-quires, and that keen-ness 
of siorht and hear-ino^ that al- 
low-ed no sign of the near-ness 
of fish to es-cape him. 

But the o^rand-est field that 
Ill-in-ois of-fer-ed the In-dian 
hunt-er for the full ex-er-cise 
of his pow-ers, was the wide- 
spread-ing prair-ies with their 
count-less herds of buff-a-lo. 
The buff-a-lo was con-fin-ed main-ly, in these days, 
to tem-per-ate lat-i-tudes, and was found in vast num- 
bers by ex-plor-ers all o-ver the grass-y plains of 
Ill-in-ois, In-di-an-a, South-ern Mich-i-gan and 
West-ern O-hi-o. 




IN-DIAN FISH-ING. 




IN-DIANS HUNT-ING THE EUFF-A-LO. 



33 



34 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

This King of the prair-ie — now fast pass-ing 
from the face of the earth — is a mag-nif-i-cent an- 
i-mal. With fi-er-y eyes and shag-gy mane, he 
prov-ed a worth-y foe-man for the In-dians pluck 
and prow-ess. The bow and ar-row, in the hands 
of the In-dian, prov-ed quite as fa-tal as the gun 
sub-se-quent-ly in-tro-duc-ed by Eu-ro-pe-ans. 
Such was the force with which their ar-rows were 
pro-pell-ed that the great-er part of them were 
gen-er-al-ly im-bed-ded in the an-i-mal, and some- 
times pro-trud-ed from the op-po-site side. 

One of the modes of kill-ing the buff-a-lo, 
prac-tic-ecl by the Ill-in-ois and oth-er tribes of In- 
dians, was to drive them head-long o-ver the pre- 
cip-i-tous banks of the riv-ers. Buff-a-lo Rock, a 
large pro-mon-to-ry, ris-ing fif-ty or six-ty feet high, 
on the north side of the Ill-in-ois, six miles be-low 
Ot-ta-wa, is said to have de-riv-ed its name from 
this prac-tice. It was cus-tom-a-ry to se-lect an 
act-ive young man and dis-guise him in the skin 
of a buff-a-lo, pre-par-ed for this pur-pose by pre- 
serv-ing the ears, head and horns. Thus dis-guis- 
ed, he took a po-si-tion be-tween a herd and a cliff 
of the river, while his com-pan-ions, on the rear 
and each side, put the an-i-mals in mo-tion, follow- 
ing the de-coy, who, on reach-ing the pre-ci-pice, 
dis-ap-pear-ed in a crev-ice pre-vi-ous-ly se-lect-ed, 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



35 



while the an-i-mals in front, press-ed by a mov-ing 
mass be-hind, were borne o-ver the brink and 
crush-ed to death on the rocks be-low. 

The In-dians of-ten 
caught laro^e num-bers of 
the buff-a-lo when the riv- 
ers were fro-zen, by driv 



ing them on the ice. 



If 




:.-^yn 



THE IN-DIAN AND HIS HORSE. 



the weight of the an-i-mal 

broke the ice, they were 

u-su-al-ly kill-ed in the 

wa-ter. But if the ice 

was too thick, they fell 

up-on its slip-per-y sur-face, and be-came help-less 

vic-tims to the hunt-er's ar-rows. 

The In-dians love for his horse, ap-proach-ed 
ver-y near af-fec-tion of the ten-der-est sort. If he 
was sick he would watch o-ver him with all the 
ten-der-ness of a nurse, and if he died he would 
mourn for him many days. And why should he 
not? Had not his horse been his on-ly com-pan- 
ion through man-y drear-ydays and through man-y 
dead-ly perils? What friend had ever been as 
faith-ful as his gal-lant steed! 



36 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



CHAP-TER VII. 

IN-DIANS IN ILL-IN-OIS LIFE AND MAN-NERS WAR- 
FARE. 

The In-dian's most ex-alt-ed thought of glo-ry 
was suc-cess in war. There was no fame Hke the 
fame of the in-trep-id, suc-cess-ful war-ri-or. War 
was not a sci-ence with him; it was an en-thu-si- 
asm, an all ab-sorb-ing pas-sion. A know-ledge 
of the art of war was in his thought the high-est 
at-tain-ment pos-si-ble. 

The a-ged chief, with paint-ed face and toss- 
ing feath-ers, re-joic-ed to talk o-ver and o-ver 
a-gain the sto-ry of his ear-ly ex-ploits, while the 
young In-dian list-en-ed, and hop-ed that for him 
there might be some such op-por-tu-ni-ties to man- 
i-fest his pith, his cour-age, and his prow-ess. 

The war par-ties of the prair-ie tribes were 
most-ly vol-un-teers. The lead-er who was am-bi- 
tious e-nough to at-tempt to raise a war par-ty, 
must, first of all, have won great fame him-self, or 
he would get no fol-low-ing. His first ap-peal 
was al-ways to the pa-tri-ot-ism and cour-age of his 
friends, and then he would play up-on the su-per- 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



37 



sti-tion of the braves, as-sur-ing them that the Great 
Spir-it had made known to him in dreams, that 
their en-ter-prise would be suc-cess-ful, and that 




THE WAR DANCE. 



their war-path would be strewn with the dead 
bod-ies of their foes. 

Paint-ing them-selves with ver-mill-ion to rep- 
re-sent blood, and bring-ing such troph-ies as they 
al-read-y had won, in the shape of scalps, they 
would com-mence their ter-ri-ble war dance. The 
war dance was a trag-e-dy in pan-to-mime. The 



j8 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

per-form-ance was an ob-ject les-son hint-ing at the 
va-ried In-ci-dents of a suc-cess-ful cam-paign. 
The braves en-ter-ing up-on the war-path ; the post- 
ing of sen-ti-nels to a-void be-ing sur-pris-ed by 
the en-em-y; the ad-vance in-to the en-em-y's 
coun-try; the form-a-tion of am-bus-cades to strike 
the un-wa-ry foe; the strife and carn-age of bat-tie; 
the fall of the foe be-neath the ter-ri-ble crash of 
the war-club or tom-a-hawk ; the re-treat of the 
en-em-y; the scalp-ing of the slain; the feast-ing 
of vul-tures on the dead bod-ies; the tri-umph-ant 
re-turn of the war-ri-ors; all was wrought out in 
won-der-ful mim-ic show. 

Af-ter the war dance, these ex-cit-ed vol-un- 
teers start-ed on the war path. On the eve of 
their de-part-ure some ven-er-a-ble chief would ad- 
dress them with in-spir-ing words. 

Here is the re-port of a speech that was ad- 
dress-ed by an old war-ri-or to a com-pa-ny of 
young braves who were go-ing forth to war: 

"Now, my brothers," he said, "de-part with 
con-fi-dence. Let your cour-age be might-y, your 
hearts big, your feet light, your eyes o-pen, your 
smell keen, your ears at-ten-tivc, your skins proof 
a-gainst heat, cold wa-ter and fire. If the en-em-y 
should prove too pow-er-ful, re-mem-ber that your 
lives are pre-cious, and that one scalp lost by you, 



^o HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

is one cause of shame brought up-on your na-tion. 
There-fore, if it be ne-ces-sa-ry, do not hes-i-tate 
to fly, and in that case be as wa-ry as the ser-pent, 
and con-ceal your-selves with the skill of the fox, 
or of the squir-rel. But al-though you run a-way, 
do not for-get that you are men, that you are true 
war-ri-ors, and that you must not fear the foe. 
Wait a-while and your time will come. Then when 
your en-em-y is in your pow-er, and you can as- 
sail him with ad-van-tage, fling all your ar-rows at 
him, and when they are all ex-haust-ed, come to 
close quar-ters, strike, knock down, and let your 
tom-a-hawks be drunk with blood." 

These In-dians gen-er-al-ly went forth in par- 
ties of a-bout for-ty, car-ry-ing with them as im-ple- 
ments of war-fare, bows and ar-rows, a war-club, 
an i-ron tom-a-hawk, a stone tom-a-hawk, and al- 
ways a well-sharp-en-ed scalp-ing knife. These 
scalp-ing knives were often of bone, but they were 
al-ways kept in good con-cli-tion for the dis-charge 
of their del-i-cate tasks. Scalp-ing was the meth- 
od by which the war-ri-or made sure proof of his 
tri-umph. The num-ber of scalps hang-ing at his 
gir-dle was the meas-ure of his suc-cess. 

Scalp-ing was an ex-ceed-ing-ly sim-ple pro- 
cess. The In-dian seiz-ed his en-em-y by the hair, 
and b}^ a skill-ful use of his knife, cut and tore — 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



4^ 



of-ten-times while his vic-tim was quiv-er-ing with 
hfe — from the top of his head, a large por-tion of 
the skin. 

These scalps were pre-serv-ed with the ut-most 
care, for two rea- 
sons; first-ly, be- 
cause the con- 
quer-or did not 
want any of the 
mem-bers of a 
hos-tile tribe to lay 
claim to his vic-to- 
ries; and, sec-ond- 
ly, be-cause the 
red man be-liev-ed 
that the pos-ses- 
sion of any part of 
the bocl-y of his 
foe, gave him end- 
less pow-er o-ver 
that foe, liv-ing or 
dead. 

In war-fare the In-dian's sub-tle-ty was no small 
se-cret of suc-cess. He had no no-tions of that 
sense of jus-tice that asks that a man shall meet 
his foe face to face. To shoot a man down from be- 
hind a tree was as praise-wor-thy as it was cun-ning. 




TAK-ING A scalp! 



42 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



War, in-deed, ra-ther than peace, was the In- 
dian's glo-ry and de-Hght; war, not con-duct-ed as 
in civ-il-i-zed times, but where in-di-vid-u-al skill, 

en-dur-ance, gal-lant-ryand 
cru-el-ty were prime re-qui- 
sites. For such a pur-pose 
as re-venge, the In-dian 
would make great sac-ri-fi- 
ces, and dis-play a pa-tience 
and per-se-ver-ance tru-ly 
he-ro-ic; but when the ex- 
cite-ment was o-ver^ he 
sank back into a list-less, 
un-oc-cu-pi-ed, well-nigh 




use-less sav-age. 



SHOOT-ING FROM BE-HIND A TREE. 



Dur-ing the in-ter-vals 
of his more ex-ci-ting pur- 
suits, the In-dian em-ploy-ed his time in dec-or-a- 
ting his per-son with all the beau-ty of paint and 
feath-ers, and in the man-u-fact-ure of his arms and 
ca-noes. These lat-ter were con-struct-ed of bark, 
and were so light that they could eas-i-ly be car- 
ried on the shoul-der from stream to stream. So 
be-tween hunt-ing, and fish-ing, and fight-ing, the 
In-dian's tune was pret-ty well oc-cu-pied. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOI<y. 43 



CHAP-TER VIII. 

IN-DIANS IN ILL-IN-OIS LIFE AND MAN-NERS RE-LI- 

GIOUS VIEWS BUR-I-AL OF THE DEAD. 

The red man of the prair-ies and the for-ests 
was nat-u-ral-Iy re-h-gious. Per-haps some would 
say that he was on-ly su-per-sti-tious. But at this 
long dis-tance of time we can well af-ford to ex-er- 
cise a lit-tle char-i-ty. 

We do not claim for the In-dian an ex-act and 
or-der-ly re-li-gious be-lief, but there were some 
rude el-e-ments of faith that call on-ly for our ad- 
mi-ra-tion. 

It is pleas-ant to think that in the old dark 
days, be-fore the birth of cul-ture and ed-u-ca-tion, 
the In-dian with his ''un-tu-tor-ed mind," did "see 
God in clouds," and did "hear him in the wind." 
He be-liev-ed in the one Great Spirit, the might-y 
Man-i-tou, the Au-thor of Life, the Up-hold-er of 
the U-ni-verse. He be-liev-ed that this Great 
Spir-it was all-wise, all-pow-er-ful, and all-good. 
That he dwelt some-times in the sun, and some- 
times in the moon, and some-times in the sky. 
He heard his voice in the roll of the thun-der. 



44 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



the crash of the cat-a-ract, and the an-gry waves of 
the sea. His God was a God of might, of ma-jes- 
ty, and of re-sist-less pow-er. But the e-vil that 
a-bound-ed in that ear-ly day, led him to con-elude 
that there must be a Bad Spir-it, sub-ject al-ways, 
of course, to the Great Good Spir-it. But the In- 
dian, who was nat-ur-ahly fear-less, had lit-tle dread 
of the spir-it of e-vil; in his rude way he be-liev-ed 
that God was o-ver all, and that the good would 
sure-ly tri-umph o-ver the e-vil. 

An-oth-er im-por-tant point in the sim-ple faith 
of the In-dian, was a firm and un-shak-en con-fi- 
dence in the doc-trine of a fu-ture life. Un-train- 
ed and un-taught as he was, e-ven he was too wise 
to think that death was the end of the think-ing 
be-ing. He be-liev-ed that be-yond the grave, be- 
yond the glo-ry of the West-ern hills there was a 
land more fair and beau-ti-ful than the prair-ies or 
the for-ests in their rich-est bloom, or the skies in 
their cloud-less splen-dor. 

To what an ex-tent this faith in a fu-ture life 
laid hold up-on these ear-ly dvvell-ers in Ill-in-ois 
may be gath-er-ed from their modes of bur-i-al. 
They did not con-tent them-selves with lay-ing the 
war-ri-or peace-ful-ly to rest, as though all was 
o-ver. But they laid with him in his grave, his war- 
club, his bow and ar-rows, his red paint; and some- 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. . 45 

times his horse was slain up-on or near his grave, 
that he might be read-y to mount and pro-ceed to 
his place of rest in the land of glo-ry be-yond the 
set-ting sun. If a wo-man of the tribe died they 
plac-ed near her a ket-tle, ca-noe pad-dies, and 
such ar-ti-cles of cloth-ing as she might be sup- 
pos-ed to re-quire on her march to the hap-py fields 
of e-ter-nal rest. 

It was a com-mon thing a-mongst the for-est 
tribes, to choose as suit-a-ble pla-ces for in-ter- 
ment, el-e-va-tecl spots a-bove the reach of floods. 
Ver-y of-ten the branch-es of a tree would be us-ed 
for this pur-pose. In the il-lus-tra-tion of an In- 
dian grave on page 46, it will be seen that the 
war-ri-or's horse has been kill-ed, and his bones 
left to bleach near the ex-alt-ed grave of his dead 
mas-ter. In a crotch of the tree the dead he-ro's 
drinking tins and oth-er u-ten-sils are plac-ed near, 
as though the dead man might want them a-gain 
at some un-ex-pect-ed mo-ment. 

The bocl-ies of the dead were wrap-ped in 
man-y kinds of grave clothes, and then plac-ed, 
some-times at full length and some-times in a sit- 
ting pos-ture, in the rud-est kind of coff-in, which 
was most fan-ci-ful-ly paint-ed in all sorts of glar- 
ing col-ors. O-ver all this the dead man's blank- 
et was stretch-ed, and fast-en-ed to the limbs of 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



47 



the trees. As long as any of the bod-y re-main-ed 
these graves were guard-ed with jeal-ous care. 
There was a deep rev-er-ence in the mind of the 
In-dian, both for the dy-ing and the dead. If, in 
the course of some con-flict, a com-rade had been 




BEAR-ING THE WOUND-ED FROM THE BAT-TLE FIELD. 

wound-ed, he was not left to die un-car-ed for and 
a-lone, but of-ten, at great risk, his com-pan-ions 
would make a rude litter and bear him a-way from 
the field of bat-tie, that he might have his wounds 
dress-ed, or that at least he might die in peace. 

It was cus-tom-a-ry, where there was a good-ly 
com-pa-ny of In-dians liv-ing to-geth-er on the lev- 
el prair-ie lands, to se-lect some place by a riv-er 



48 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



or stream, a lit-tle el-e-va-ted, if pos-si-ble, as 
the gen-er-al bur-i-al place of the tribe. These 
an-cient In-dian cem-e-ter-ies pre-sent-ed a ver-y 
re-mark-a-ble ap-pear-ance. One rea-son for the 




AN IN-DIAN PRAIR-IE CEM-E-TERY. 



el-e-va-tion of the bod-ies of the dead, was to keep 
them free from the on-slau^ht of wolves and oth-er 
pests of the prair-ie; and the huge flags that were 
plac-ed here and there o-ver bod-ies more re-cent- 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



49 



ly in-ter-red, were in-tend-ed to keep off wolves, 
vul-tures, and other birds of prey. 



CHAP-TER IX. 



IN-DIANS IN ILL-IN-OIS LIFE AND MAN-NERS- 

CEL-LA-NE-OUS. 



MIS- 



While the In-dian of this ear-ly date was a 
man of mark-ed in-di-vid-u-al-i-ty, he had con-sid- 
er-a-ble re-spect for or-gan-ized ef-fort. To fol-low 
the chief of his tribe, to yield o-be-di-ence to the 
or-ders of coun-cils, was with him a point of hon- 
or. There was a deep rev-er-ence in the heart of 
the red man for 
the a-ged mem- 
bers of his tribe. 
The Gen-er- 
al Coun-cils of 
the In-dians 
werecom-pos-ed 
of the chiefs and 
old men of the 
tribe. When 
in coun-cil they 
sat in cir-cles round the speak-er. It was not 




IN-DIANS IN COUN-CIL. 



50 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

thought good man-ners to ap-plaud, so the grave 
hst-en-ers sat hi sol-emn si-lence, save now and 
then when an ap-prov-ing grunt would es-cape 
some un-guard-ed hps. Be-fore be-gin-ning bus-i- 
iiess, a brave ap-pear-ed with the sa-cred pipe, and 
then an-oth-er brought fire to hght it, Af-ter the 
pipe was ful-ly a-hght, it was pre-sent-ed to the 
heav-ens, then to the earth, then to the Great Spir- 
it, and last-ly, to the chiefs pres-ent, each of whom 
took a whiff, and then the prop-er bus-i-ness of the 
Coun-cil be-gan. 

The lan-ouacre of the In-dians con-sist-ed of 
on-ly a few words com-par-a-tive-ly speak-mg, and 
so, hke the an-cient Jews, they had to make up in 
fig-ures of speech, what they lack-ed in lang-uage. 
Yet, if the speech-es that were de-hv-er-ed in these 
coun-cils coukl be coklect-ed in a vokume, it would 
form one of the most in-ter-est-ing books in the 
whole lit-er-a-ture of el-o-quence. One of the most 
gift-ed of all the great In-dian or-a-tors was Pon- 
ti-ac, of whom we shall hear more la-ter on. 

The so-cial in-stincts of the In-dians were de- 
vel-op-ed grad-u-al-ly as the years pass-ed on. Of 
a mo-rose and ta-ci-turn dis-po-si-tion, they be-came 
more gen-i-al and kind by in-ter-course with oth-er 
ra-ces of men, and in time they be-gan to man-i- 
fest a fine spir-it of cour-te-sy and hos-pi-tal-i-ty. 



HISTORY- OF ILLINOIS. 



5^ 



Strang-ers would oc-ca-sion-al-ly vis-it their camps, 
and if once they were as-sur-ed that these vis-its 
were not with hos-tile in-tent, they would put a-side 
all sus-pi-cion and bid them wel-come to their wig- 
wams, their corn and their pipes of peace. And 
if, af-ter some such pleas-ant in-ter-view, these 
strang-ers should re- 
turn af-ter their bus-i- 
ness was com-plete, 
they would be sure of a 
most cor-di-al greet-ing. 
The chief of the tribe 
would go forth to the 
verge of the camp-ing 
ground, and with the 
right hand stretch-ed 
forth would speak the 
words of wel-come: ''I- 
tah! I-tah! Good be 
with you! Come and 
eat!" 

But wo be-tide the 
man who should be- 
tray this hos-pi-tal-i-ty, 
as was of-ten done ; it would only be a ques-tion of 
time, and that not long, be-fore his scalp would 
hanor at the belt of some brave of the in-sult-ed tribe. 




i-tah! i-tah! — "GOOD BE WITH YOU. 



52 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

Some-times de-tail-ed re-cords of these oc-ca- 
sions were kept, in crude In-dian fash-ion, es-pe- 
cial-ly if the trav-el-ing par-ty was a large and im- 
por-tant one. 

A care-ful ex-am-i-na-tion of the ac-com-pa-ny- 
ing spe-ci-men of In-dian re-cords, will serve to 
show, at least, that these dusk-y chil-dren of the 
for-est and the prair-ie were not with-out con-sid- 
er-a-ble bus-i-ness tact, and a keen sense of or-der. 
There were no news-pa-pers in those times to an- 
nounce, that on a certain day, a com-pa-ny of 
w^iite men with In-dian guides, had been en-ter- 
tain-ed at Ca-ho-kia, or De-ca-tur, or at Sa-van-na, 
a fa-vor-ite place of meet-ing, just un-der the shad> 
ow of In-dian Rock. 

Such en-ter-tain-ments were fre-quent, and the 
re-cords ot them were care-ful-ly kept. 

The par-tic-u-lar ac-count here pre-sent-ed, shows 
that on this oc-ca-sion, a com-pa-ny of four-teen 
whites and two In-dians had spent the night at 
some giv-en point, and had far-ed well. 

The com-pa-ny in this case was ev-i-dent-ly a 
sur-vey-ing par-ty with a mil-i-tary es-cort. 

No. I rep-re-sents, some-what rucle-ly, the com- 
mand-ing of-fi-cer, sword in hand; No. 2, the sec- 
re-ta-ry with his book; No. 3, the ge-ol-o-gist with 
his ham-mer; Nos. 7 and 8, are In-dian guides^ 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



53 




SPE-CI-MEN OF IN-DIAN RE-CORDS. 



as Is in-di-ca-ted by their not wearing hats; Nos. 
9 and lo, in-di-cate the white sol-diers with their 

arms; Nos. 
II and 12, 
s h o w that, 
amongst oth- 
er things, they 
had en-joy-ed 
the lux-u-ries 
of prair-ie 
chicken and 
real turtle at 
their feast; 
Nos. 13, 14, 15, show that three camp fires had 
burn-ed in hon-or of the par-ty ; and the in-cli-na- 
tion of the poles in the hands of the guides, show 
that the guests had pur-sued their jour-ney in an 
east-er-ly di-rec-tion. 

The bit-ter-ness and cru-el vin-dic-tive-ness of 
which the red man was some-times ca-pa-ble, was 
seen in his va-ri-ous modes of re-venge. In fair, 
o-pen fight, he was for the most part dis-pos-ed to 
fight fair-ly; but when it came to be a ques-tion of 
ven-geance, his fu-ry knew no bounds. The poi- 
son-ed ar-row was one of the fa-vor-ite weap-ons of 
his un-bound-ed ha-tred. 

A ven-er-a-ble In-dian ar-row ma-ker thus ex- 



54 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

plains how the In-dians used to poi-son their ar- 
rows: — "First, we take a bloat-ed vel-low rat-tie- 
snake in Au-o^ust, and tie him with a fork-ed stick 
to a stake. Then we an-noy and tease him till he 
is in a orreat rao^e. We then take the liv-er of 
some an-i-mal — a deer or an an-te-lope. The 
snake will strike at it a-gain and a-gain with its 
poi-son-ous fangs, and very soon the liv-er will turn 
jet black. Ar-rows are then brought, and their 
i-ron heads are push-ed in-to the black liv-er up to 
the shaft. They are left stick-ing there for an hour, 
and then they are dried in the sun, and so pow-er- 
ful is the poi-son, that if these ar-rows but touch 
raw flesh, death is speed-y and cer-tain. But the 
In-dians have long since giv-en up the cru-el use 
of these dead-ly weap-ons. 

In con-clud-ing this sketch of In-dian life and 
man-ners, we must not o-mit a no-tice, how-ev-er 
brief, of the a-muse-ments in which es-pe-cial-ly the 
young-er In-dians in-dulg-ed. The pas-times of 
the In-dian were sim-ple, lim-it-ed, and crude. 
Yet there was no lack of real en-joy-ment, for if 
the games were few, the play-ers en-ter-ed in-to 
such plea-sure as they gave, with the great-est zest. 
Mr. Ell-i-ott,*a great au-thor-i-ty on In-dian life 
and man-ners, says: "An In-dian youth, al-though 
in-tense-ly in-ter-est-ed in a game from the be-gin- 




HOW IX-DIANS POI-SON-ED THEIR AR-ROWS. 



55 



56 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

ning to the end, ap-pear-ed to be just as well 
pleas-ed, and laugh-ed just as heart-i-ly, when 
beat-en as when vic-to-ri-ous. If the game was a 
gamb-ling one, as were most of their games of 
skill, he would un-con-cern-ed-ly part with his last 
piece of cloth-ing, laugh-ing as cheer-ful-ly as when 
he be-gan the game." 

The boys had their ball games, both "shin-ny" 
and foot-ball ; they flew kites made of fish blad- 
ders ; spun their rude tee-to-tums ; play-ed at tag, 
hide and seek, blind man's buff, hunt the slip-per, 
and all such mer-ry de-lights. The girls had their 
dolls, and though the boys and girls did not of-ten 
play to-geth-er, they might some-times be seen en- 
gag-ed in those time-hon-or-ed oc-cu-pa-tions of 
keep-ing house or wig-wam, and mak-ing pies of 
the rich, yield-ing mud of the prair-ies. 

With the men of the In-dian tribes, one of the 
fa-vor-ite games of the win-ter was play-ing ball or 
''shin-ny" on the ice. And al-though the game 
was some-times of a most ex-ci-ting char-ac-ter, it 
was gen-er-al-ly con-duct-ed with great good hu- 
mor. They had been brought up to re-gard a 
game as a thing to be en-joy-ed for its own sake. 
Fight-ing was one thing, play-ing was an-oth-er. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS S7 



CHAP-TER X. 

FIRST WHITE MEN IN ILL-IN-OIS MAR-QUETTE AND 

JOL-I-ET. 

Chief a-mongst the first white men who trod 
the prair-ies and sail-ed the riv-ers of Ill-in-ois, 
and made a def-i-nite mark on the his-to-ry of this 
hap-py and pros-per-ous re-gion, were Jac-ques 
Mar-quette, and Lou-is Jol-i-et. The for-mer was 
a Jes-u-it mis-sion-a-ry, born in France in 1637; 
the lat-ter was an ex-plor-er who was born of 
French pa-rents, at Que-bec, in Can-a-da, in the 
year 1645. 

Ear-ly in the Sev-en-teenth Cen-tu-ry, a-bout 
the time the '* May-flow-er" sail-ed out from South- 
amp-ton wa-ter, a num-ber of de-vout French mis- 
sion-a-ries of the or-der of the So-ci-e-ty of Je-sus — 
an or-der form-ed by a Span-ish Knight of the 
Six-teenth Cen-tury, named Ig-na-tius Loy-o-Ia — 
made up their minds to come to A-mer-i-ca and 
tell the sto-ry of the life and teach-ings of Je-sus 
Christ to the In-dians. 

These earn-est, ho-ly men, made their head- 
quar-ters at Mon-tre-al, in Can-a-da, where there 



^S HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

were a Cath-e-dral and a very large school, not so 
much de-sign-ed for the gen-er-al ed-u-ca-tion of 
the peo-ple, as for the train-ing of young men for 
the priest-hood, and for this great work of bear-ing 
the gos-pel to those who dwelt on the prair-ies, and 
on the banks of the riv-ers and the great lakes. 
One of their num-ber, Fa-ther Al-lou-ez, is said 
to have jour-ney-ed hun-dreds of miles far-ther 
west than any pre-vi-ous ex-plor-en In the year 
1667, he first heard of the Ill-in-ois In-dians, whom 
he great-ly de-sir-ed to vis-it. Fa-ther Al-lou-ez 
had a great am-bi-tion to do some-thing to-wards 
u-ni-ting all the In-dian tribes of the West. To 
this end he thought it would be a good thing to 
hold a con-fer-ence of the chiefs of the va-ri-ous 
tribes, at Green Bay. In car-ry-ing out this plan, 
he sent Nich-o-las Per-rot to the site on w^iich the 
city of Chi-ca-go now stands, to in-vite the chiefs 
of an In-dian tribe liv-ino^ in that neio^h-bor-hood 
to join the coun-cil of peace. Per-rot reach-ed the 
banks of the Chi-ca-go riv-er in the au-tumn of 
1670, and was prob-a-bly the first white man who 
set his foot upon the prair-ie soil of Ill-in-ois. 
What came of this pro-pos-ed con-fer-ence we are 
not told. 

Mar-quette and Jol-i-et set out on their long 
jour-ney of ex-plo-ra-tion, in which they were ver-y 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. s9 

anx-ious to vis-it the tribes of In-dians all a-long 
the banks of the Mis-sis-sip-pi, and to dis-cov-er 
any oth-er tribes who might be dwell-ing in-land. 
They left Mack-in-aw in May, 1673. Coast-ing 
a-lonuf the north-ern shore of Lake Mich-i-oran 
they en-ter-ed Green Bay, and pass-ed thence up 
the Fox riv-er and Lake Win-ne-ba-go till they 
came to a vil-lage of the Mas-cou-tins and Mi- 
am-is. At this vil-lage they found a good-ly num- 
ber of In-dians, and what glad-den-ed them most 
of all was to see a cross plant-ed in the midst of 
the place, de-co-ra-ted with some of the most val- 
ued of In-dian im-ple-ments. They were in-tro- 
duc-ed with great cer-e-mo-ny to a coun-cil of chiefs, 
when Mar-quette, point-ing to Jol-i-et, said : '' My 
friend is an en-vov from France, to dis-cov-er new 
coun-tries, and I am an am-bass-a-dor from God, 
to en-light-en them with the truths of the Gos-pel." 
The re-quest forguidefs was cor-di-al-ly re-spond-ed 
to, and they jour-ney-ed on their way in peace. 
Ar-riv-ing at the port-age, they car-ri-ed their ca- 
noes and scan-ty bag-gage to the Wis-con-sin riv-er, 
a dis-tance of three miles. At this point their 
guides re-fus-ed to go any far-ther. They did not 
want to see the great river, for they said there were 
de-mons dwell-ini^ in the riv-er, whose aw-ful 
voi-ces could be heard for man-y miles. Faint of 



6o 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



heart, they made the most of the dan-gers of the' 
jour-ney. If they were not de-stroy-ed by the de- 
mons, they said they were al-most sure to be 
drown-ed in the riv-er, and if the de-mons and the 
riv-er spar-ed them, it would on-ly be that they 
might fall vic-tims to the hos-tile dwell-ers on the 
shore. 

But Mar-quette and Jol-i-et were not faint of 
heart ; they were not to be mov-ed thus eas-i-ly 
from that great pur-pose to which they had con-se- 
cra-ted their lives. They thank-ed the guides for 
all their kind-ness and help, and for all the in-for- 
ma-tion they had giv-en them, and 
then pray-ed with them and said 
"fare-well." 

"Fare-well! Fare-well!" The 
guides an-swer-ed, "I-tah! I-tah ! 
Good be with you ! " And as the last 
guide pass-ed from sight, he was seen 
to stretch forth his right hand as if 
in the at-ti-tude of ben-e-dic-tion. 

Mar-quette and Jol-i-et now turn- 
ed their fa-ces to the West. They 
float-ed gent-ly down the Wis-con-sin 
riv-er, pass-ing shores and is-lands of rare and 
match-less beau-ty. 

At last, came in part, the re-al-i-za-tion of their 




"fare-well! 
well! 



FARE- 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 6r 

dreams. It was a love-ly sum-mer morn-ing, the 
17th of June, 1673, when, with joy great-er than 
words could tell, they push-ed their frail barks out 
on the floods of the lord-ly Mis-sis-sip-pi, the 
''Great Fa-ther of Wa-ters," as the In-dian lov-ed 
in la-ter days to call it. For days they pass-ed a 
con-stant suc-ces-sion of head-lands, sep-a-ra-ted by 
love-ly val-leys cov-er-ed with ver-dure, and rich 
with flow-ers of ev-er-y hue and form. By-and-by, 
great herds of buff-a-lo were seen sweep-ing like 
clouds a-longthe prair-ie, while now and then some 
tim-id mem-ber of the herd would stand a mo-ment 
and gaze, as if in de-fi-ance, at the strang-ers who 
dar-ed to come so near their grass-y realm. 

As they float-ed on, a hun-dred miles and more 
from the mouth of the Wis-con-sin riv-er, this 
ques-tion forc-ed it-self, a-gain and a-gain, up-on 
the at-ten-tion of Jol-i-et: 

"Where does, this riv-er rise, and in-to what 
does it flow?" 

"We will find that out," said Mar-quette, "but 
we must not for-get that our mis-sion is to seek the 
souls of the red man of the for-est." 

As their barks float-ed on the rest-less wa-ters, 
they watch-ed, with ea-ger eyes, for the faint-est 
trace of the In-dian. 

All things come to those who watch and wait. 



62 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

and to these ear-ly voy-a-gers there came at last, 
what they so much long-ed to see, the sign of hu- 
man foot-prints on the east-ern shore of the Mis- 
sis-sip-pi. 

Care-ful-ly se-cur-ing their ca-noes by fast-en- 
ing them to trees, they as-cend-ed the bank of the 
riv-er, and fol-low-ed, with joy-ful hearts, the long 
sought In-dian trail. Af-ter walk-ing a-bout six 
miles they came to an In-dian vil-lage, from which 
four In-dians came out to meet them, whose friend- 
ly dis-po-si-tion was seen in the fact that they 
brought with them their pipes of peace, their cal-u- 
mets, bril-liant with col-or-ed plumes. As Mar- 
quette and his com-pan-ion drew near, the In-dians 
sa-luted them in the mem-o-ra-ble words — 

''We are Ill-in-ois! We are men!" 

As soon as Mar-quette told them of the mis- 
sion of him-self and his friend, a most hearty in-vi- 
ta-tion was of-fer-ed to en-ter their vil-lage and 
a-bide with them for a time. Here they were pre- 
sent-ed to the chief of the tribe, who gave them a 
true In-dian welcome. 

"How beau-ti-ful the sun shines, oh! French- 
men," he said, ''when you come to vis-it us." 

Af-ter Mar-quette — whom the In-dians call-ed 
"Black-gown," hav-ing ref-er-ence to his priest-ly 
.at-tire — had more full-y ex-plain-ed to the chief 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 63 

the re-li-gious mo-tives that had led him to seek 
out these Sons of the For-est, the chief fur-ther 
re-ph-ed. 

"I thank the Black-gown, and thee, al-so," 
point-ing to Jol-i-et, "for com-ing to vis-it us. 
Nev-er has the earth been so beau-ti-ful, and nev- 
er has the sun shone so bright-ly as to-day„ Nev- 
er has our riv-er been so calm and so free from 
rocks. Your ca-noes have swept them a-way. 
Nev-er has our to-bac-co had so fine a fla-vor, nor 
our corn so prom-is-ing as we see it to-day, now 
that you are with us! 

"Here is my son," con-tin-ued the chief, giv- 
ing to the French-men a lit-tle boy who had been 
cap-tur-ed from an-oth-er tribe, and one the chief 
had a-dopt-ed. "I give him to you that you may 
know our hearts. I im-plore you to take pit-y 
up-on me and all my fol-low-ers. You know the 
Great Spir-it who has made us all! Ask him to 
give life, and come and dwell a-mong us that we 
may know him." 

The lit-tle boy was then pre-sent-ed to Mar-- 
quette, and at the same time a rich-ly or-na-ment- 
ed peace pipe, the chief add-ing — 

"This is the sa-cred cal-u-met. Where-ev-er 
you bear it, it sig-ni-fies peace. All our tribes will 
re-spect it, and it will pro-tect you from harm ! " 



64 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



The next day a grand ban-quet was giv-en, 
con-sist-ing for the most part, of hom-i-ny, fish, 
buff-a-lo, and dog's-meat. The French-men great- 
ly en-joy-ed the re-past, though they ate ver-y 
spar-ing-ly of the dog's-meat, which some-what as- 
ton-ish-ed the In-dians, who re-gard-ed dog's-meat 
as a ver-y great del-i-ca-cy. 

Af-ter stay-ing with this hos-pit-a-ble tribe for 
a sea-son, Mar-quette and Jol-i-et re-solv-ed to 

fol-low the 
course of the 
Mis-sis-sip- 
pi. A num- 
ber of the 
In-dians ac- 
com-pa-ni-ed 
them to the 
riv-er bank, 
and bid-ding 
them a most 
kind-ly fare- 
well, wav-ed 
their arms till the boats float-ed be-yond the reach 
of their vi-sion. 

Mar-quette and Jol-i-et, and their com-pan- 
ions, de-scend-ed the Mis-sis-sip-pi till they were 
per-fect-ly sat-is-fied that the Great Fa-ther of Wa- 




MAR-QUETTE AND JOL-I-ET 
DE-SCEND-ING THE MIS- 
SIS-SIP-PI RIV-ER. 



66 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

ters emp-tied its floods in-to the Gulf of Mex-i-co. 
They then re-turn-ed, and hav-ing reach-ed the 
39th de-gree of north lat-i-tude, en-ter-ed the 111- 
in-ois riv-er, and fol-low-ed it to its source. 

The tribe of Ill-in-ois In-dians who dwelt on 
the banks of this riv-er urg-ed Mar-quette to stay 
and live with them. But ex-press-ing a de-sire to 
con-tin-ue his trav-els, he was con-duct-ed by one 
of the chiefs and sev-er-al war-ri-ors of the tribe, to 
Chic-a-go, in the neigh-bor-hood of which, he re- 
main-ed to preach the Gos-pel to the Mi-am-is, 
whilst his com-pan-ions re-turn-ed to Que-bec to 
an-nounce their won-der-ful dis-cov-er-ies. 

Two years la-ter, Mar-quette en-ter-ed the lit- 
tle riv-er in the State of Mich-i-gan, call-ed by his 
name. On its ver-dant bank he e-rect-ed a rude 
al-tar, said mass af-ter the or-der of the Cath-o-lic 
church ; and be-ing left a-lone at his own re-quest, 
he kneel-ed down by the side of the al-tar, and 
of-fer-ingto the Might-i-est sol-emn thanks-giv-ing 
for all the guid-ing and pro-tect-ing care of Heav- 
en, he com-mend-ed his soul to Al-might-y God, 
and fell in-to the long dream-less sleep that knows 

nowak-ine. And as one has beau-ti-ful-ly said — 
(J ... 

''The light breeze from the lake sung his re-qui- 
em, and the Al-gon-quin na-tion be-came his 
mourn-ers." 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 67 

Jol-i-et nev-er re-turn-ed West, but de-vo-ted 
him-self to trade. He died in 1700. 



CHAP-TER XI. 

LA SALLE AND TON-TL 

Re-ne Rob-ert Cav-al-ier de La Salle, was born 
in Rou-en, France, on the 2 2d of No-vem-ber, 
1643. His ear-ly days were spent un-der the 
ver-y shad-ow of that great Cath-o-lic Cath-e-dral 
of Rou-en, that has been for cen-tu-ries the won- 
der and ad-mi-ra-tion of the world. 

In his youth, La Salle was fond of stud-y, in 
fact books were his chief com-pan-ions on to his 
ear-ly man-hood. He was train-ed for the priest- 
hood, and was in-tend-ed for the or-der of the Jes- 
u-it Mis-sion-a-ries, Af-ter his course of ed-u-ca- 
tion was com-ple-ted he sail-ed for Can-a-da, where 
he was ex-pect-ed to de-vote him-self whol-ly to 
mis-sion-a-ry work. He soon be-came a great fa- 
vor-ite with the In-dian tribes. And such was his 
skill and pow-er of ap-pli-ca-tion, that he soon be- 
came thor-ough-ly mas-ter of sev-en dif-fer-ent In- 
dian di-a-lects. 



68 . HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

But he was of a rest-less mood. Nev-er lonof 
con-tent with w^hat he had done, he was al-wavs 
look-ing out to some-thing be-yond. Dur-ing the 
win-ter of 1668-9, he had en-ter-tain-ed a band of 
Sen-e-ca In-dians at his fort on the St. Law-ence, 
and they fill-ed him full of en-thu-si-asm con-cern- 
ing the O-hi-o riv-er, which took its rise in their 
ter-ri-to-ry, and ac-cord-ing to their word, flow-ed 
west-ward a dis-tance of nine month's trav-el by 
ca-noe. 

I n the sum-mer of 1669, he, with four-teen men, 
set out to ex-plore the O-hi-o riv-er. Af-ter much 
hard, earn-est work, they found that the O-hi-o 
emp-tied it-self in-to a great riv-er that flow-ed on 
and on, un-til it was lost in the far South. 

The four-teen men who start-ed out with him 
on this en-ter-prise, be-came dis-heart-en-ed, and 
de-sert-ed their lead-er. He was now home-less, 
friend-less, a wan-der-er a-mid the wilds, with-out 
food or shelter. He lived on roots and such 
ve-ge-ta-bles as the for-est yield-ed. He trust-ed 
much, and not in vain, to the kind-ness of the In- 
dians. He went from tribe to tribe, learn-ing 
their clif-fer-ent lan-gua-ges, and stud-y-ing their 
va-ri-ous modes of life. He lov-ed the tribes of 
the red man, and did all he could to make his life 
no-ble, and pros-per-ous, and glad. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 6g 

The fame Mar-quette had won, led La Salle, 
af-ter man-y re-mark-a-ble and suc-cess-ful ex-ploits, 
to de-ter-mine on ex-plor-ing the in-te-ri-or of 111- 
in-ois, and then to push his way to the un-dis-cov- 
er-ed glo-ries of the Mis-sis-sip-pi Val-ley. He left 
a small fort he had e-rect-ed on the St. Jo-seph 
riv-er, in charge of ten men, and de-scend-ed 
the Ill-in-ois as far as Lake Pe-o-ria, where he met 
large num-bers of Li-dians, who, anx-ious to ob- 
tain ax-es and fire-arms, were quite read-y to of-fer 
him the pipe of peace, and to prom-ise a friend-ly 
al-li-ance. He was glad of this heart-y and cor- 
di-al re-cep-tion. And when La Salle spoke of 
set-tling French col-o-nies in this re-gion, the joy 
of the In-dians knew no bounds. They were 
read-y to do ev-er-y-thing for him he de-sir-ed. 
They went so far as to of-fer to give him a safe 
and trust-y es-cort to the Mis-sis-sip-pi. 

But La Salle's means were all ex-haust-ed. 
He had man-ag-ed to build a fort, which he call-ed 
Creve Coeur La Salle, and he had al-so es-tab- 
lish-ed a trad-ing post at this spot. The on-ly 
chance he saw of pur-su-ing his ex-plo-ra-tions suc- 
cess-ful-ly, was for him to go to Can-a-da and get 
the need-ful aid. Ac-cord-ing-ly, leav-ing Ton- 
ti, in charge of the fort and the trad-ing post. 
La Salle set out on foot for Can-a-da. 



70 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

Dur-ing the ab-sence of this young but bold 
dis-cov-er-er, a large bod-y of war-ri-ors of the 
Ir-o-quois came down and ex-ci-ted the foes of 
La Salle to hos-til-i-ties. They made Ton-ti a-ban- 
don the e-rec-tion of a new fort, on Rock Fort, a 
cliff on the Ill-in-ois riv-er, and drove him to seek 
re-fuge a-mongst the Mi-am-is. 

Af-teratime La Salle re-turn-ed with men and 
mon-ey. He found Ton-ti and his com-pan-ions. 
The whole com-pa-ny left Chi-ca-go, which was 
then a trad-ing post, on the 4th of Jan-u-a-ry, 1682, 
and hav-ing a large barge which had been built on 
the Ill-in-ois riv-er, ready for their em-bark-a-tion, 
they de-scend-ed the Mis-sis-sip-pi riv-er to the 
sea. La Salle was en-chant-ed. The re-sour-ces 
of that great fer-tile val-ley sur-pass-ed his fond-est 
dreams. His ex-ul-ta-tion knew no bounds. He 
plant-ed the arms of France on the shores of the 
Gulf of Mex-i-co. He claim-ed the coun-try for 
France and for his King, Louis XIV., and call-ed 
the new-found re-gion, Lou-i-si-an-a. 

On as-cend-ing the riv-er af-ter this tri-umph- 
ant suc-cess, a part of the com-pa-ny stay-ed be- 
hind at Kas-kas-ki-a and Ca-ho-ki-a, and the re-gion 
round a-bout. This set-tle-ment was soon sought 
out by French Can-a-di-ans, and oth-ers. There 
are rem-nants of those ear-ly times lin-ger-ing still 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS, 



71 



at Ca-ho-ki-a. The house oc-cu-pi-ed by Dr. 111- 
in-ski is be-liev-ed to date back to this time ; the 
old Court house still re-mains, and the church at 
Ca-ho-ki-a is claim-ed to be the old-est church in 
West-ern A-mer-i-ca. 

La Salle re-turn-ed to his be-lov-ed France by 
way of Can-a-da, and hav-ing giv-en a most glow- 







CHURCH AT CA-HO-KI-A. 



ing ac-count of all he had seen and done, to his 
roy-al mas-ter, Lou-is XIV., he was en-trust-ed 
with the com-mand of an-oth-er ex-pe-di-tion, fit- 



72 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



ted out by the King him-self, for the pur-pose of 

ef-fect-ino: the set-tle-ment of Lou-i-si-an-a. 

<_> 

This last ex-pe-di-tion of the he-ro-ic La Salle 
was full of dis-as-ter. His fleet in-ad-vert-ant-ly 
pass-ed the mouth of the Mis-sis-sip-pi, his com- 
pan-ions would not re-turn, and he was, there-fore, 
forc-ed to land. Here he found-ed a set-tle-ment, 
but dis-as-ter fol-low-ed dis-as-ter; the col-o-ny 
dwin-dled down from 250 to 50 per-sons. La Salle 
re-solv-ed to leave twen-ty men at the fort and go 
once more to Can-a-da for sup-plies. While on 
his way to the land that had nev-er fail-ed him, he 
was foul-ly mur-der-ed by two of his own men, on 
the 17th of March, 1687. So per-ish-ed, by the 
hands of as-sas-sins, one of the no-blest men who 
ev-er breath-ed the free, fresh air of Ill-in-ois. 
The life that had been, from first to last, a grand 
sac-ri-fice to the wel-fare of his fel-low men, was at 
last crown-ed with mar-tyr-dom. 



CHAP-TER XH; 

SET-TLE-MENTS IN ILL-IN-OIS MIS-SION LIFE AND WORK. 

It has been re-peat-ed-lyas-sert-ed that La Salle 
had noth-ing what-ev-er to do with the ear-ly set- 
tle-ment of Ill-in-ois. And yet, the state-ment 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS, 73 

made in the last chap-ter, to the ef-fect that a large 
nuni-ber of the fol-low-ers of La Salle, who jour- 
ney-ed with him to the Gulf of Mex-i-co, de-ter- 
mined to end their wan-der-ings, and set-tie down 
to a qui-et, peace-ful life, rests on rea-son-a-ble ev- 
i-denee. These wan-der-ers from France and 
Can-a-da, chose the mouth of the Kas-kas-kia riv-er 
as the place of their a-bode. Hence, Kas-kas-kia 
be-came the first set-tle-ment in Ill-in-ois, and 
a-bout the same pe-ri-od, oth-ers of the same com- 
pa-ny set-tied in Ca-ho-ki-a, near to what is now 
known as Belle-ville, in St. Clair coun-ty. 

It is ev-i-dent that these set-tle-ments were 
made with the heart-y good will of La Salle, for 
m the spring of 1682, large num-bers of peo-ple 
flock-ed to this re-gion from Can-a-da, urg-ed, as 
they said, by La Salle, to make a per-ma-nent home 
in what he was pleased to call, ''This Par-a-dise of 
Ill-in-ois." 

Mis-sions were soon es-tab-lish-ed, and, in- 
deed, it was not ver-y long be-fore the Jes-u-it 
cler-gy had the joy of see-ing church-es ris-ing here 
and there on the prair-ies, and all in good time, 
Kas-kas-ki-a was a-ble to boast of a Cath-e-dral. 

The be-gin-ning of the Eigh-teenth Cen-tu-ry 
saw a bright-er day dawn-ing for Ill-in-ois, The 
sol-i-ta-ry place was to be made glad with grow-ing 



7/ HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

pop-u-la-tions, and the prair-ie and the fo^-est were 
to be made as beau-ti-ful as the Gar-den of the 
Lord. 

How much this great State, with its hap-py 
homes, its won-der-ful ed-u-ca-tion-al ad-van-ta-ges, 
its church-es by thou-sands, rear-ing their spires 
all o-ver the prair-ies, and by the banks of the riv- 
ers, and in the crowd-ed cit-ies ; owe to the mis- 
sion-a-ries of that ear-ly day, will nev-er be ful-ly 
known. But this is cer-tain, if all oth-er ar-gu- 
ments fail, the his-to-ry of Ill-in-ois is an in-fal-li- 
ble ar-gu-ment in fa-vor of mis-sion-a-ry ef-fort. 
Much as we owe to ex-plor-ers and dis-cov-er-ers, 
we are not the less in-clebt-ed to those de-vout men, 
who, in the midst of per-ils and dan-gers with-out 
num-ber, sought to en-rich the lives of the peo-ple 
with the bless-ings of the Gos-pel of Peace. How- 
ev-er much we may hon-or the names of Jol-i-et 
and La Salle, not the less wor-thy of hon-or are 
the names of Mar-quette, Bin-ne-teau, Ma-rest, 
Mer-met, and Char-le-voix. 

It would, in-deed, be ver-y de-light-ful if we 
could look up-on the scenes that made glad and 
beau-ti-ful those ear-ly days. A mis-sion would 
be es-tab-lished, and all a-bout the place of pray-er 
the men would be bus-y at their tasks, grmd-ing 
corn, cut-ting lum-ber, and rear-ing hum-ble homes. 



6 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



The fields were work-ed in com-mon. The peo- 
ple rais-ed all they ate, ex-cept what fell be-fore 
their ar-rows and their guns, or the fish they caught 
in the streams, and creeks, and riv-ers. It was a 
sim-ple, hap-py life, the peo-ple liv-ed — prob-a-bly 
quite as hap-py as the lives of thou-sands to-day 
who, if they en-joy tiie lux-u-ry of civ-i-li-za-tion, 
have al-so to bear its bur-dens. 

Mr. Ban-croft thus de-scribes the life of those 
days, re-fer-ring to Fa-ther Mer-met, and the mis- 
sion at Kas-kas-ki-a : 

"The gen-tle vir-tues and fer-vid el-o-quence of 
Mer-met made him the soul of the mis-sion at 
Kas-kas-ki-a. At ear-ly dawn his pu-pils came to 
church, dress-eel neat-ly and mod-est-ly, each in a 
deer-skin, or robe, sewn to-geth-er from sev-er-al 
skins. Af-ter re-ceiv-ing les-sons, they chant-ed 
can-ti-cles; mass was then said in the pres-ence of 
all the Chris-tians, the French and the con-verts — 
the wo-men on one side and the men on the oth-er. 
From pray-ers and in-struc-tions, the mis-sion-a- 
ries pro-ceed-ecl to vis-it the sick, and ad-min-is-ter 
med-i-cine, and their skill as phy-si-cians did more 
than all the rest to win con-fi-clence. In the af- 
ter-noon the cat-e-chism w^as taught in the pres- 
ence of the young and the old, where ev-er-y-one, 
with-out dis-tlnc-tion of rank or age, an-swer-ed the 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 77 

ques-tions of the mis-sion-a-ry. At e-ven-ing, all 
would as-sem-ble at the chap-el for in-struc-tion, 
for pray-er, and to chant the hymns of the church. 
On Sun-days, and on fes-ti-vals e-ven, af-ter ves- 
pers, a hom-i-ly was pro-nounc-ed. At the close 
of day, par-ties would meet in hous-es to re-cite 
the chap-lets in al-ter-nate choirs, and sing psalms 
till late at night." 

In the year 171 1, Fa-ther Ma-rest, who had 
charge of the mis-sion at Ca-ho-ki-a, and who had 
been suc-cess-ful in con-vert-ing man-y In-dians to 
the faith, was urg-ed by an In-dian chief liv-ing 
near Lake Pe-o-ri-a, to go o-ver to Pe-o-ri-a and 
preach the Gos-pel to his be-night-ed breth-ren. 
Af-ter pon-der-ing o-ver the mat-ter for a long time, 
Fa-ther Ma-rest made up his mind to go and do 
what he could at Pe-o-ri-a. His own ac-count of 
this jour-ney of 150 miles, serves to show that mis- 
sion-a-ry life in Ill-in-ois 170 years a-go, was in- 
deed, "life in earn-est." 

Writ-ing of these times, and of this par-tic-u- 
lar jour-ney to Pe-o-ri-a, on which he en-ter-ed on 
Good Fri-day, 171 i, the good Fa-ther says: 

"Our life is pass-ed in roam-ing through thick 
woods; in clam-ber-ing o-ver hills; in pad-dling 
the ca-noe a-cross lakes and riv-ers to catch a poor 
sav-ao^e who flies from us, and whom we can tame 



y8 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

neith-er by teach-ings, nor by ca-ress-es. I de- 
part-ed for Pe-o-ria, hav-ing noth-ing a-bout me but 
my cru-ci-fix and my brev-i-a-ry, be-ing ac-com-pa- 
ni-ed by on-ly three sav-a-ges, who might a-ban- 
don me from lev-i-ty, or from fear of en-em-ies 
might fly. The hor-ror of these vast, un-in-hab- 
it-ed for-est re-gions, where in twelve days not a 
soul was met, al-most took a-way my cour-age. 
Here was a jour-ney where there was no vil-lage, 
no bridge, no fer-ry, no boat, no house, no beat-en 
path, and o-ver bound-less prair-ies, in-ter-sect-ed 
by riv-u-lets and riv-ers ; through for-ests and thick- 
ets, fill-ed with bri-ars and thorns ; through marsh- 
es, where we plung-ed, some-times up to the gir-dle. 
At night, re-pose was sought on the grass, or on 
leaves, ex-pos-ed to wind and rain, hap-py if by 
the side of some riv-u-let, of which a draught might 
quench thirst. A meal was pre-par-ed from such 
game as was kill-eel, or by roast-ing ears of corn." 

Fa-ther Ma-rest's mis-sion was quite a suc-cess. 
Pe-o-ri-a soon be-came a tra-ding post, and in 
1732 a beau-ti-ful church was built. 

So in these ear-ly days Chris-tian cul-ture and 
civ-il-i-za-tion went to-geth-er, hand in hand, lay- 
ing, with much la-bor and man-y pray-ers, the 
foun-da-tions of fu-ture great-ness. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. yg 



CHAP-TER XIII. 

ILL-IN-OIS UN-DER FRENCH RULE. 

For a long time all the set-tle-ments of Ill-in- 
ois, and those that were found-ed la-ter, on the 
low-er Mis-sis-sip-pi, by D'Ib-er-ville, and his 
broth-er Bein-ville, had been sep-a-rate de-pen- 
den-cies of Can-a-da. They were af-ter-wards 
u-ni-ted as one prov-ince, un-der the name of Lou- 
i-si-an-a, hav-ing Mo-bile for its cap-i-tal. In i 7 1 1 
Di-rou d'Ar-ta-quette be-came its first Gov-ern-or 
Gen-er-al. 

It was the firm pur-pose of the French to set- 
tle and cul-ti-vate this whole re-gion, and al-so to 
for-ti-fy it as strong-ly as pos-si-ble a-gainst the 
Eng-lish, whose pow-er and in-flu-ence in the East 
dail-y in-creas-ed. 

The next year, 1712, Lou-is XIV., King of 
France, ap-point-ed Sieur An-tho-ny Cro-zat — a 
man of great wealth and a-bil-i-ty, who had been 
for many years an of-fi-cer of the roy-al house- 
hold — to the task of ex-pand-ing the com-merce of 
this new and prom-is-ing prov-ince, in the in-ter- 
ests of France. 



8o HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

It was be-liev-ed that there was bound-less 
wealth hid-den be-neath the sur-face of the fruit-ful 
soil. Mines of gold and sil-ver, of pearls and pre- 
cious stones. Of all these treas-ures Cro-zat was 
to take charge. He was per-mit-ted to search, 
o-pen, and dig all mines, veins, min-er-als, through- 
out the whole coun-try, and he was to trans-port 
the pro-ceeds to an-y port in France. 

The vast re-gion thus farm-ed out, ex-tend-ed 
from Can-a-da on the north, to the Gulf on the 
south ; and from the Al-le-ghan-ies on the east, to 
the Rock-y Moun-tains and the Bay of Mat-a- 
gor-da on the west. 

Cro-zat be-gan his work with great hope and 
en-er-gy. He was join-ed in his ef-forts by La- 
Motte Cad-i-lac, but the search for gold and 
sil-ver and pre-cious stones was all in vain. Large 
quan-ti-ties of lead and iron ore were found in 
Mis-sou-ri, but the search for gold m Lou-i-si-an-a 
was not a suc-cess. The fur trade was in the 
hands of the Eng-lish. The mis-sion of Cro-zat 
was a great fail-ure. In-stead of mak-ing a large 
a-mount of mon-ey, he lost heav-i-ly. Af-ter five 
years of this un-suc-cess-ful strug-gle, he beg-ged 
the King to permit him to re-turn to France, which 
he did in i 71 7. 

Cro-zat's grand mis-take lay in search-ing for 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 8i 

gold and sil-ver ore, in-stead of turn-ing at-ten-tion 
to the land. The gold was not to be found fath- 
oms deep be-neath the ground, but in the great 
rich-ness of the soil. For the sow-er who went 
forth to sow, there was a gold-en har-vest ; for the 
min-er, fail-ure and loss. 

The white pop-u-la-tion of the coun-try had 
slow-ly in-creas-ed. There were prob-a-bly 380 
white peo-ple a-long the banks of the Low-er Mis- 
sis-sip-pi, and 320 in Ill-in-ois. 

In I 71 5, the ven-er-a-ble Lou-is XIV., King 
of France, died, leav-ing to his grand-son, Lou-is 
XV., — who was then on-ly a boy of five years' 
old — the throne of France and a debt a-mount-ine 
to the great sum of o-ver six-ty mill-ion dol-lars. 

This boy King was of course, much too young 
to take any part ni rul-ing a great na-tion, so the 
Duke of Or-leans was ap-point-ed Re-gent, and it 
was his du-ty to take charge of public af-fairs till 
the young King came of age. The French peo-ple 
were in great trou-ble. They had heav-y debts, 
and knew not where to get the mon-ey to pay them. 
Ev-cr-y-thing was in sad con-fu-sion, and the Duke 
of Or-leans found his en-er-gies tax-ed to the ut- 
ter-most to pay the in-ter-est due on the e-nor-mous 
na-tion-al debt. A spir-it of reck-less spec-u-la-tion 
seiz-ed the French people, and their thoughts were 



.82 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

turn-ed once more to the dis-tant col-o-ny on the 
banks of the Mis-sis-sip-pi. The be-hef that a-way 
in Lou-i-si-an-a there were mines of sil-ver and 
gold and pre-cious stones, was still held by man-y, 
and there were oth-ers who sought to strength-en 
these dreams with the hope that they might pro-fit 
by the de-lu-sion„ 

In the midst of all this fi-nan-cial trou-ble came 
what is call-ed, *'The Mis-sis-sip-pi Scheme," an 
'C-vent that prov-ed to be the great-est fraud of the 
Eight-eenth Cen-tu-ry. 

In I 716, John Law, by birth a Scotch-man, 
by trade a gam-bler and bank-er, and by in-stinct 
a scoundrel, came to France with a great scheme 
that was to put an end to all mon-ey trou-bles. 
By per-mis-sion of the Duke of Or-leans he es-tab- 
lish-ed a bank, whose wealth con-sist-ed, not in 
mon-ey, but in debts. John Law said that France 
had such bound-less wealth in hercol-o-nies, that her 
prom-ise to pay was just as good as mon-ey, as it 
was on-ly a ques-tion of time when all her ports 
would be crowd-ed with ships bring-ing cost-ly 
treas-ure. This bank soon be-came the great na- 
tion-al bank of France, and peo-ple grew wild in 
their de-sire to in-vest their good mon-ey on the 
strength of these shal-low prom-ises. 

A trad-ing com-pa-ny was form-ed, bear-ing the 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 83 

name of the West-ern Com-pa-ny with 200,000 
shares at a-bout $100 a share. The com-mer-cial 
su-prem-a-cy of the whole re-gion of Lou-i-si-an-a, 
which Lou-is XIV., had grant-ed Cro-zat, and . 
which, as we have seen, he sur-ren-der-ed af-ter 
the most la-ment-a-ble fail-ure, was erant-ed to this 
new com-pa-ny. 

De-sign-ing, sel-fish, and most un-scrii-pu-Ious 
men, re-viv-ed the sto-ries a-bout the gold and sil- 
ver mines on the banks of the Mis-sis-sip-pi. And 
to as-sure the un-be-liev-ing, men were brought who 
ex-hib-it-ed spe-ci-mens of gold and silver ore, and 
sol-emn-ly swore that these spe-ci-mens had been 
dug from the banks of the Mis-sis-sip-pi. All 
sorts of prom-is-es were made. France was to 
grow rich in a day. Fool-ish peo-ple from all 
parts of Eu-rope, smit-ten with this wild, fi-nan- 
cial fe-ver, flock-ed to France. Build-ings were 
en-larg-ed, hotels were built to ac-com-mo-date the 
grow-ing crowds. It is said that in less 'than a 
month 300,000 peo-ple came to Par-is, anx-ious to 
in-vest all they had, in the won-der-ful ''Mis-sis- 
sip-pi scheme." In Lon-don, the rage was at fe- 
ver heat. Desks and ta-bles were to be seen on 
all the side-walks, and the good sense of that gen- 
er-al-ly staid and qui-et me-trop-o-lis gave place to 
the wild-est and the most fool-ish spec-u-la-tion. 



84 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

Lords, la-dies, priests, trades-men, all sorts of peo- 
ple, were in mad haste to in-vest what-ev-er mon-ey 
they could lay their hands on. E-ven beg-gars and 
pro-fes-sion-al thieves gath-er-ed to-geth-er their 
ill-oot-ten wealth, and in-vest-ed in the fa-mous 
''Mis-sis-sip-pi scheme." Ves-sels bound for A-mer- 
i-ca were la-den with em-i-grants, and large and va- 
ried car-goes. To use a com-mon phrase, the 
whole val-ley of the Mis-sis-sip-pi was un-der-go- 
ing a won-der-ful "boom !" 

But the "won-der-ful scheme" prov-ed a "bub- 
ble." At the first de-mand for mon-ey the whole 
af-fair ut-ter-ly fail-ed. And in-stead of grow-ing 
rich in a day, vast for-tunes were lost In an hour, 
and man-y thou-sands who had trust-ed ev-er-y- 
thing to the gen-i-us and in-teg-ri-ty of John Law, 
were com-plete-ly beg-gar-ed. 

Be-fore the crash came, how-ev-er, John Law 
had built, at a fab-u-lous cost. Fort Chart-res, a 
lit-tle north of Kas-kas-ki-a. Law had won great 
re-nown. Some thought him a saint, oth-ers, the 
great-est fi-nan-cial gen-i-us the world had ev-er 
seen. He was call-ed "the Sav-ior of France,' 
"the De-liv-er-er of his Age;" but when the bub- 
ble burst, the peo-ple who had call-ed him a saint 
were read-y to stone him to death. For a time he 
sought ref-uge with the Duke of Or-leans. But 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 85 

he bare-iy es-cap-ed be-ing torn to ple-ces by the 
wrong-ed and in-sult-ed people. He made his 
way to Ven-ice, where he died in the most ab-ject 
pov-er-ty in the year 1729. 

1 1 is an ill wind that blows no good. This great 
fraud aided in the set-tling up of Ill-in-ois. By 
1730, it is es-ti-ma-ted that there were not less 
than 5,000 white set-tiers be-tween the Kas-kas- 
ki-a and the Ill-in-ois riv-ers. The Jes-u-it cler-gy 
had built a col-lege at Kas-kas-ki-a, and a mon-as- 
ter-y was found-ed at the same place. A large 
com-pa-ny of monks and nuns came o-verwith the 
view of find-ing a per-ma-nent home in the West. 

In the year 1726, the ven-er-a-ble Bien-ville, 
who had been call-ed the " Fa-ther of Lou-i-si- 
an-a," and who had great-ly en-dear-ed him-self, 
both to the In-dians and to the set-tiers, was suc- 
ceed-ed by M. Per-rier, who be-came Gov-ern-or 
of Ill-in-ois and a large por-tion of the val-ley. 
Not long af-ter he had set-tied, the new Gov-ern-or 
man-i-fest-ed a strong: feel-ino^ of dis-like to-ward 
the In-dians, and to the Chic-a-saw tribe m par- 
tic-u-lar. Bien-ville had no-ted, what he thought, 
were to-kens of treach-er-y on the part of the In- 
dians to-ward the French, but he had always 

man-ao^-ed throuoh-out his lono^ ad-min-is-tra-tion, 

. 'I 111 

to keep on friend-ly terms with them, though he 



86 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

nev-er great-ly trust-ed them. He watch-ed them 
with a cau-tious eye. 

M. Per-rier was lack-ing in that gen-tle-ness 
and pru-dence that mark-ed the whole ca-reer of 
the pop-u-lar Bien-ville. Where Bien-ville made 
friends, Per-rier made bit-ter, sub-tie, se-cret foes. 
The In-dians were grow-ing more and more jeal- 
ous of the Whites, who were dail-y in-creas-ing in 
num-ber, wealth and in-flu-ence. M. Per-rier was 
un-wise in tak-mg se-ri-ous no-tice of lit-tle faults, 
and fre-quent-ly ver-y harsh and se-vere pun-ish- 
ment was giv-en for the most triv-i-al of-fen-ses. 
This at-tempt to rule the In-dian w^ith a rod of 
i-ron was a very grave mis-take, as e-vents soon 
prov-ed. 

Grow-ing rest-less under these man-y forms of 
pet-ty tyr-an-ny, the Chic-a-saws and Natch-ez In- 
dians, with oth-er tribes, re-solv-ed on de-stroy-ing 
the French. A-gents were sent to the Ill-in-ois 
In-dians to in-duce them to join the con-spir-a-cy. 
The at-tack was to be made in dif-fer-ent pla-ces 
at the same time. The plot was well laid, and if 
no hind-rance had come in the way of its be-ing 
car-ried out, a most fright-ful slaught-er would have 
fol-low-ed. Scarce-ly a white man would have 
been left in the whole val-ley to tell the aw-ful 
sto-ry. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



87 



The In-dians had ar-rang-ed that each tribe 
was to have a bun-die of sticks, and that be-gin- 
ning with the next new moon, a stick was to be 




THE TER-RI-BLE MAS-SA-CRE OF 1 729. 



thrown a-way at the end of each day, and when 
all the sticks were thrown a-way then the aw-ful 
trag-e-dy was to be-gin. Eith-er by ac-ci-dent, or 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



by treach-er-}', the l3un-clle re-ceiv-ed by the Natch- 
ez tribe had few-er sticks than the oth-ers, and 
hence they struck the first blow. At day-dawn of 
the fa-tal 28th of No-vem-ber, 1729, the Great 
Chief, with a band of cho-sen war-ri-ors, each hav- 
ing con-ceal-ed wea-pons, made their way to Fort 
Ro-sa-he, and kill-ed ev-er-y French-man in the 
ht-tle rar-ri-son. The as-cend-in^r smoke from the 
burn-ing fort l^e-came a sig-nal for oth-ers of the 
re-volt-ing tribes, and in a short space of time 700 
of the white male pop-u-la-tion had been slaugh- 
ter-ed. While the dread-ful butch-er-y was go-ing 
on, the Great Chief seat-ed him-self in the ware- 
house of the West-ern Com-pa-ny, and with the 
most per-fcct care-less-ness smok-ed his pipe, while 
the heads of his fall-en foes were be-ing pil-ed up 
in the form of a pyr-a-mid. 

As soon as the mas-sa-cre be-came known, M. 
Per-rier set to work in the most vig-or-ous man-ner 
to quell the con-spir-a-cy. In this mat-ter he was 
suc-cess-ful, though the task was a long and dif-fi- 
cult one. The Natch-ez tribe, led by their chief. 
Great Sun, fled a-cross the Mis-sis-sip-pi and for- 
ti-fied them-selves on Black ri\-er. But the French 
troops, aid-ed by the Choc-taw In-dians and oth-er 
set-tiers, fol-low-ed in hot pur-suit, and in two bat- 
tles they were ut-ter-ly rout-ed. Great Sun, and 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 8g 

400 of his war-ri-ors, were cap-tured and tak-en to 
New Or-leans, and thence to San Do-min-go^ and 
sold as slaves. So end-ed the great Natch-ez 
war, and with it the Natch-ez tribe per-ish-ed. 

The fa-mous West-ern Com-pa-ny had be-come 
so im-pov-er-ish-ed by the fail-ure of John Law's 
schemes, and the ver-y large ex-pen-di-ture in- 
volv-ed in the pros-e-cu-tion of the Natch-ez war, 
de-ter-min-ed to ask the King of France for per- 
mis-sion to sur-ren-der their char-ter. 

The four-teen years dur-ing w^hich the Com- 
pa-ny had con-troll-ed af-fairs, had been years of 
com-par-a-tive pros-per-i-ty. The white pop-u-la- 
tion had in-creas-ed Irom 700 to 5,000. The wild 
dreams a-bout gold, and sil-ver, and pre-cious 
stones, gave place to the more thor-ough cul-ti-va- 
tion of the soil. Set-tiers be-gan work-ing on their 
own ac-count, in-stead of for wild spec-u-la-tors. 
Tents and wig-wams were re-plac-ed by hous-es ; 
lit-tle groups of hous-es grew in-to vil-lag-es, and 
vil-lag-es grew in-to towns. 

On the loth of A-pril, i 732, the King of France 
grant-ed the re-quest of the West-ern Com-pa-ny, 
their char-ter was sur-ren-der-ed, and a pro-cla-ma- 
tion was is-sued de-clar-ing Lou-i-si-an-a free to all 
his sub-jects, with e-qual priv-i-leg-es as to com- 
merce and oth-er in-ter-ests. 



go HISTORY OF ILLINOIS, 



CHAP-TER XIV. 

MORE TN-DIAN TROU-BLES WAR WITH CHIC-A-SAWS. 

At the sur-ren-der-ing of the char-ter by the 
West-ern Com-pa-ny, the Gov-ern-ment of France 
re-sumecl its con-trol of pub-hc af-fairs. M. Per- 
rier re-main-ed Gov-ern-or-Gen-er-al, M. d'Ar-ta- 
quette be-came lo-cal Gov-ern-or of 111-in-ois, while 
Bien-ville was placed in charge of South-ern Lou- 
i-si-an-a. One of the prin-ci-pal ends Per-rier had 
in view, was to make sure his au-thor-i-ty o-ver the 
va-ri-ous In-dian tribes in-hab-it-ing the coun-try 
un-der his com-mand. 

But the Chic-a-saws of Ken-tuck-y and Ten- 
nes-see, in-flu-enc-ed part-ly by Eng-lish col-o-nists, 
and part-ly by the dead-ly ha-tred of the French, 
made things most un-com-fort-a-ble. Bus-i-ness 
could on-ly be con-duct-ed at the great-est risk, and 
the set-tiers all the way from the Ill-in-ois riv-er 
down to NewOr-leans, were kept in a con-di-tion 
of con-stant a-larm. They nev-er knew at what 
mo-ment an at-tack might be made up-on them, or 
up-on their homes. Se-cret en-voys were sent by 
this hos-tile tribe to urge the Ill-in-ois In-dians to 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. gi 

join them in a plan to put an end to the whole of 
the white pop-u-la-tion. In this, how-ev-er, they 
were not wise, for the In-dians of Ill-in-ois not 
on-ly re-fus-ed to join their con-spir-a-cy, but se- 
cret-ly sent word to the French of the dan-ger that 
threat-en-ed them. And hav-mg thus warn-ed 
them, they then offer-ed their ser-vi-ces m these 
fig-u-ra-tive and im-pres-sive words: 

"This is the pipe of peace or war; you have 
but to speak, and our braves will strike the na-tions 
that are your foes." 

Bien-ville at once be-gan march-ing north-ward 
to join his for-ces with those of d'Ar-ta-quette. 
His ar-my m-creas-ed large-ly as he pro-ceed-ed. 
He add-ed to his for-ces a com-pa-ny of Choc-taw 
In-dians, 1,200 ni num-ber, to whom he of-fer-ed 
a large re-ward for the scalps of Chic-a-saws. It 
was im-pos-si-ble to re-strain these new al-lies. 
Bien-ville was anx-ious to join the north-ern for-ces 
un-der d'Ar-ta-quette, but the for-tunes of war 
seem-ed to be all a-gainst him. 

In the mean-time d'Ar-ta-quette, ac-com-pa- 
nied by De Vin-cennes and Fa-ther Le-nat, march- 
ed at the head of a small band of French-men and 
a-bout 1,000 In-dians, with the hope of meet-ing 
the for-ces of Bien-ville, then march-ing north- 
ward. On the 20th of May, these rash In-dians, 



^2 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

who had plen-ty of head-strong cour-age, but ht-tle 
judgment and less pa-tience, com-pell-ed their 
lead-er to com-mence the at-tack. The Chic-a- 
saws were driv-en from two of their forts, but in 
the at-tempt to take a third, d'Ar-ta-quette was 
wound-ed. The loss of their lead-er so con-fus-ed 
these In-dian braves, that they fled and were pur- 
sued by bands of their vic-to-ri-ous foes a dis-tance 
of 125 miles. 

d'Ar-ta-quette was too sore-ly wound-ed to re- 
treat, and his brave com-pan-ions, De Vin-cennes 
and Le-nat, re-fus-ed to leave him to die a-midst 
his foes. The Chic-a-saws kept these il-lus-tri-ous 
pris-on-ers for a while, prob-a-bly an-ti-ci-pa-ting 
that large ran-soms would be of-fer-ed for them. 
Their wounds were staunch-ed, and they were 
treat-ed with a show of kind-ness. 

A-bout ten or twelve days after this de-feat, 
Bien-ville, with his for-ces, came up-on a strong- 
hold of the Chic-a-saws. The pru-dent French 
sol-dier would glad-ly have post-pon-ed ac-tion till 
he had at least heard from d'Ar-ta-quette, but his 
Choc-taw al-lies were rash and rest-less. The 
fort was but a log fort, they said, but it had been 
built un-der the di-rect su-per-vi-sion of the Eng- 
lish — who at least un-der-stood the art of war — and 
was strong-er than the ag-gres-sive par-ty thought. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. gs 

At break of day, on a bright May morn-ing, 
the Choc-taws com-men-ced the as-sault, ex-pect- 
ing to take the hi-mates by sur-prise. But ev-er-y 
Chic-a-saw was at his post, and the re-pulse was 
as suc-cess-ful as it was de-ter-min-ed. Twice dur- 
ing the day Bien-ville tried to car-ry the fort, but 
he suf-fer-ed the most mark-ed de-feat. He was 
re-puls-ed with a loss of six-ty-five wound-ed and 
thir-ty-two kill-ed. Mor-ti-fi-ed at these loss-es, he 
dis-band-cd his In-dian al-lies threw his can-non 
in-to the riv-er, and re-turn-ed to New Or-leans a 
de-feat-ed and dis-gust-ed man. 

The vic-to-ri-ous Chic-a-saws who held d'Ar- 
ta-quette and De Vin-cennes in bond-age, hear-ing 
of the de-feat of Bien-ville in the South, a-ban- 
don-ed all hope of ran-som, and so re-solv-ed to 
glut their ap-pe-tite for re-venge. They bore 
their pris-on-ers to an ad-ja-cent field and made 
them the vic-tims of a sav-age tri-umph. They 
were bound to stakes, and burn-ed to death be-fore 
slow fires. But their la-test breath was spent in 
pray-er, while their fiend-ish foes clanc-ed round 
the dy-ing mar-tyrs, and with wild yells mock-ed 
their ag-o-ny and pain. 

When Bien-ville heard of the bar-ba-rous treat- 
ment to which these north-ern lead-ers had been 
sub-ject-ed, he ask-ed for leave to fit out an-oth-er 



94 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



ex-pe-di-tion a-gainst the Chic-a-saws. Hap-pi-ly, 
how-ev-er, af-ter man-y pre-pa-ra-tions, this con-flict 
was a-vert-ed. The Chic-a-saws sued for peace, 
They pledged them-selves nev-er a-gain to pa-tron- 
Ize the Eng-hsh, and in any con-flict that might 
en-sue they prom-is-ed to send troops to aid the 
French. So end-ed the Chic-a-saw War. 

Af-ter the es-tab-hsh-ment of friend-ly re-la-tions 
with the Chic-a-saws, the na-tive tribes through-out 
the Val-ley of the Mis-sis-sip-pi vow-ed al-le-giance 
to France, and with a time of peace there came, 
al-so, a time of pros-per-i-ty. Ag-ri-cul-ture free 
from mo-nop-o-hes, and com-pa-nies sprang in-to 
new hfe. Ev-er-y ves-sel brought new set-tiers 
from France, and man-y Can-a-dians grow-ing 
wear-y of their se-vere win-ters, sought a home in 
the mild-er cli-mate of Ill-in-ois. The day of mo- 
nop-o-lies and com-pa-nies end-ed, a new im-pulse 
was giv-en to per-son-al ef-fort, and the trade be- 
tween the north-ern and south-ern part of the 
prov-ince was great-ly ex-tend-ed. The ten years 
from I 740 to 1750 were years of stead-y growth in 
Ill-in-ois, hap-py, pros-per-ous homes be-gan to dot 
the prair-ies and fringe the river banks. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. gs 



CHAP-TER XV. 

THE CON-SPIR-A-CY AND DEATH OF PON-TI-AC. 

With the fall of Que-bec the dom-i-nance of the 
French in North A-mer-i-ca came to an end. 
Man-y bit-ter jeal-ous-ies had ex-ist-ed be-tween 
France and Eng-land. They had been at war 
with each oth-er for man-y years, and the an-i-mos- 
i-ties grow-ing out of these long and an-gry feuds 
were car-ri-ed to the New World. The vic-to-rv 
at Que-bec gave the Eng-lish new cour-age, and of 
course a-woke in the hearts of the French, and of 
the In-dians un-der their teach-ing, a deep and 
re-lent-less ha-tred. When the Eng-lish press-ed 
on to-ward the West, they were met with the charge 
that they had no right what-ev-er to these fruit-ful 
lands. To which they re-pli-ed that in the year 
1744, they had bought these lands of the In-dians 
of the East. But it was im-me-di-ate-lyan-swer-ed 
that the Ir-o-quois In-dians of New York had on-ly 
fool-ed these Eng-lish spec-u-la-tors, by sell-ing 
them rights and ti-tles which they did not pos-sess. 
No doubt the Eng-lish would have press-ed 
their way west-ward much ear-li-er than they did, 



g6 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

but for the fact that the French pow-er in Can-a- 
da, sup-port-ed by the In-dian tribes, was of too 
se-ri-ous a na-ture to be tri-fled with. But with 
the fall of that ro-man-tic cit-a-del of Que-bec their 
cour-age rose. Ma-jor Rob-ert Rog-ers was sent 
to reap all the pos-si-ble re-sults of this vic-to-ry. 
No-vem-ber, 1760, found him on the south-ern 
shore of Lake E-rie, mak-ing his way with all speed 
to De-troit, for the pur-pose of mak-ing peace with 
the French and the In-dians. Bad weath-er set 
in, and a camp was form-ed in a for-est near at 
hand. 

Sev-er-al chiefs vis-it-ed Rog-ers, and a-mongst 
the rest, the fa-mous chief-tain Pon-ti-ac, the lead- 
ing spir-it of the In-dian tribes, ap-pear-ed. He 
chare-ed Roo^-ers, in a com-mand-^r.c tone, to re- 
main for the pres-ent where he was. The next 
day he made an-oth-er vis-it ; he then told the 
English am-bass-a-dor, that he and his peo-ple 
were quite will-ing to be at peace with the Eng- 
lish, and suf-fer them to re-main in their coun-try 
as long as they treat-ed him and his peo-ple with 
re-spect and jus-tice. 

Pon-ti-ac was a man of great per-son-al pow-er. 
He had a fine, com-mand-ing pres-ence. His 
com-plex-ion w^as ver-y dark, his fea-tures stern 
and bold, his whole bear-ing de-no-tecl a man of 




PON-TI-AC. 



97 



g8 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

im-per-i-ous will. He was gen-er-al-ly dressed in 
ver-y scan-ty gar-ments, his long hair flow-ing 
loose-ly a-bout his neck. On pub-lie oc-ca-sions he 
was plum-ed and paint-ed af-ter the man-ner of his 
tribe. No man knew bet-ter than Pon-ti-ac when 
to wear the skin of a lion, and when the skin of 
the fox. This was the time to play the fox. The 
pow-er of France was de-clin-ing; it might be well 
to be on friend-ly terms with the new mas-ters. 
In any case, by ap-pear-ing to be friend-ly he could 
gain time, and this, per-haps, was Pon-ti-ac's chief 
pur-pose. 

When Rog-ers, with the Eng-lish force, reach- 
ed the mouth of the De-troit riv-er, they were met 
by 400 In-dian war-ri-ors who would have made 
any fur-ther pro-gress ex-treme-ly dif-fi-cult at least, 
but for the in-ter-po-si-tion of Pon-ti-ac, who per- 
suad-ed his old friends to look kind-ly on the new 
com-ers. But there was a light in his eye, and an 
ac-cent in his voice, that those who knew him in- 
ti-mate-ly could well un-der-stand. 

On the 29th of No-vem-ber, 1760, De-troit 
pass-ed into the hands of the Eng-lish. Pon-ti-ac 
had no love for the Eng-lish, and his na-tive tribe, 
the Sacs, who were great-ly in-flu-enc-ed by the 
Ill-in-ois French, were a-mong the first to sup-port 
him in his daring con-spir-a-cy. Pon-ti-ac was now 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. gg 

fifty years of age, and there en-ter-ed in-to his bus-y 
brain the dark plot of at-tack-ing all the Eng-lish 
forts on the same day. And hav-ing kill-ed ev-er-y 
man in the gar-ri-sons, the de-fence-less set-tle- 
ments were then to be at-tack-ed, and the en-tire 
Eng-lish pop-u-la-tion was to be ex-ter-min-a-ted. 

To pre-pare for this dread-ful e-vent, Pon-ti-ac 
him-self vis-it-ed all the dif-fer-ent tribes. He told 
them that the French King had been sleep-ing, 
but was now a-wake! He play-ed much up-on 
the sym-pa-thies of the French by such speech-es 
as these : 

''I love the French, and have led hith-er my 
braves to main-tain your au-thor-i-ty, and vin-di- 
cate the in-sult-ed hon-or of France. But you 
must no long-er re-main in-ac-tive, and suf-fer your 
red broth-ers to con-tend a-lone a-gainst the foe who 
seeks our com-mon de-struc-tion. We de-mand 
of you arms and war-ri-ors to as-sist us, and when 
the Eng-lish dogs aredriv-en in-to the sea, we will 
a-gain, in peace and hap-pi-ness, en-joy with you 
these fruit-ful for-ests and prair-ies, the no-ble her- 
it-age pre-sent-ed by the Great Spir-it to our an- 
ces-tors." 

But Pon-ti-ac's con-spir-a-cy was on-ly part-ly 
suc-cess-ful. The blow came, as near-lv as can be 
as-cer-tain-ed, a-bout the 7th of May, i 763. Nine 



lOO 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



Brit-ish posts were ta-ken, and man-y of these re- 
morse-less In-dians are said to have ht-ter-al-ly 
drank the blood of these mur-der-ed Eng-lish-men, 
from the hol-low of their fiend-ish hands. Not 




HOMES BURN-ED AND FAM-I-LIES DRIV-EN OUT TO DIE IN THE 

WOODS. 

on-ly were the forts as-sail-ed, but the homes of 
un-of-fend-ing set-tiers were burn-ed, and their 
fam-i-lies were driv-en out to die in the woods. 
In this blood-y fray, hun-dreds of men, wo-men 
and chil-dren were put to death, with most re-volt- 
ing cru-el-ty. Wo-men were com-pell-ed to stand 
and see their chil-dren's brains dash-ed out while 
wait-ing their turn to be mur-der-ed. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. loi 

Pon-ti-ac's im-me-di-ate point of ac-tion was the 
gar-ri-son at De-troit. Ev-er-y-thing was ar-rang- 
ed. Pon-ti-ac, with six-ty oth-er chiefs was to hold 
a coun-cil with Ma-jor Glad-wyn with-in the Fort. 
They all a-greed to have guns con-ceal-ed un-der 
their blan-kets, and at a giv-en sign they were to 
be-gin the work of death. 

That this plan was frus-tra-ted was ow-ing to 
the mer-ci-ful in-ter-po-si-tion of a beau-ti-ful Chip- 
pe-wa maid-en who was said to be in love with 
Glad-wyn, but who cer-tain-ly de-sir-ed to save his 
life. She made an ex-cuse to go to the Fort to 
take Glad-wyn a pair of moc-ca-sins which he had 
ask-ed her to make, and then she found op-por-tu- 
ni-ty to put Glad-wyn on his guard. 

The next day, when Pon-ti-ac and his com- 
rades came to the Fort, they were sur-pris-ed and 
con-found-ed to see that the whole gar-ri-son was 
un-der arms. When ask-ed the mean-ing of this, 
Glad-wyn step-ped forth, and sucl-den-ly draw-ing 
a-side a blan-ket from one of the chiefs, re-veal-ed 
the con-ceal-ed mus-ket. Pon-ti-ac turn-ed pale, 
and tried to make ex-pla-na-tions. But he and 
his blood-thirst-y fol-low-ers were dis-miss-ed with 
a se-vere warn-ing, nev-er a-gain to at-tempt to en- 
ter the Fort. 

Pon-ti-ac at once laid sieo^e to the Fort, but he 



102 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

did not suc-ceed in ta-king it, though he main- 
tain-ed op-er-a-tions for a long time. At last he 
gave up all hopes of suc-cess, and came to Ill-in-ois 
and made vig-or-ous ef-forts to per-suade the Ill- 
in-ois tribe, and those who were liv-ing in the 
neigh-bor-hood of St. Lou-is, to en-ter on a war 
with the whites. But his ef-forts were all in vain. 
For three years Pon-ti-ac liv-ed in the se-clu-sion 
of the woods and prair-ies, sup-port-ing his fam-i-ly 
as a hunts-man. Hear-ing of signs of trou-ble be- 
tween the white pop-u-la-tion and the In-dians, he 
came to the front once more. At Ca-ho-ki-a he 
found a num-ber of his In-dian friends en-gag-ed 
in a drunk-en rev-el ; he soon be-came drunk him- 
self, and start-ed sing-ing wild mag-i-cal songs. 
An Eng-lish tra-der in the vil-lage, who look-ed 
up-on Pon-ti-ac as the e-vil spir-it of his age, of- 
fer-ed an Indian, of the Kas-kas-ki-a tribe, a bar- 
rel of whis-ky to kill him. The as-sas-sin ac-cept- 
ed the bribe, fol-low-ed the drunk-en chief in-to 
the woods, and bur-i-ed his tom-a-hawk in his 
brain. So end-ed the ca-reer of Pon-ti-ac, who, 
though re-gard-ed by the In-dians as the great-est 
he-ro of his age, died the death of a dog, at the 
hand of one of his own race. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 103 



CHAP-TER XVI. 

ILL-IN-OIS BE-COMES A BRIT-ISH PROV-INCE. 

In the year 1762, France, by a se-cret treat-y, 
hand-ed Lou-i-si-an-a o-ver to Spain, to pre-vent 
its fall-ing in-to the hands of the Eng-hsh, who 
were fast be-com-ing mas-ters of the en-tire West. 
In the year fol-low-ing, 1763, the fa-mous Treat-y 
of Par-is was sign-ed at Fon-tain-bleau, by which 
this whole re-gion came in-to the hands of the 
Eng-hsh, By this treat-y, all the re-gions east of 
the Mis-sis-sip-pi weregiv-en o-ver to the Eng-lish, 
but it was not un-til the loth of Oc-to-ber, 1765, 
that the en-sign of France was dis-plac-ed on the 
ram-parts of Fort Char-tres, by the flag of Great 
Brit-ain. 

Cap-tain Ster-ling, of the 42d Roy-al High- 
land-ers, took pos-ses-sion of Fort Char-tres in the 
name of the King, bring-ing with him a roy-al 
pro-cla-ma-tion, prom-is-ing civ-il and re-lig-ious 
hb-er-ty, and urg-ing up-on all peo-ple the du-tyof 
con-duct-ing them-selves "like good and faith-ful 
sub-jects, a-void-ing, by a wise and pru-dent de- 
mean-or, all cause of com-plaint a-gainst them." 



104 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

Cap-tain Ster-ling did not live to see any great 
im-prove-ment in this lone-ly col-o-ny. He died 
a-bout three months af-ter his ar-ri-val, and was 
suc-ceed-ed by Ma-jor Fra-zer, who, in turn, was 
suc-ceed-ed by Col-o-nel Reed. Af-ter eigh-teen 
months of a mean, tyr-an-ni-cal ad-min-is-tra-tion, 
in which Reed play-ed the part of the pet-ty mil-i- 
ta-ry op-pres-sor, he was re-mov-ed, and on the 5th 
of Sep-tem-ber, 1868, Lieu-ten-ant-Col-o-nel Wil- 
kins reign-ed in his stead. 

Up to this time there had been no civ-il ad- 
min-is-tra-tion of jus-tice in Ill-in-ois. Col-o-nel 
Wil-kins be-gan his of-fi-cial work by is-su-ing a 
pro-cla-ma-tion for a civ-il ad-min-is-tra-tion of the 
laws of the coun-try. For this pur-pose he ap- 
point-ed sev-en ma-gis-trates or judg-es from 
a-mong the peo-ple, who were to form the civ-il tri- 
bu-nal, and to hold month-ly terms of court. A 
term of this court was held, com-menc-ing De-cem- 
ber 6th, 1768, at Fort Char-tres, which was the 
first com-mon law ju-ris-dic-tion ev-er ex-er-cis-ed 
with-in the pres-ent lim-its of Ill-in-ois. 

In the first pro-cla-ma-tion of the King of Great 
Brit-ain, is-su-ed in Oc-to-ber, 1763, it was ex- 
press-ly laid down that there should be no ta-king 
or pur-chas-ing of lands in an-y of the A-mer-i-can 
col-o-nies, with-out spe-cial leave or li-cense be-ing 



io6 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

first ob-tain-ed. But in spite of this dis-tinct stip- 
u-la-tion, Col-o-nel Wil-kins pro-ceed-ed to par-eel 
out the rich lands, o-ver which he rul-ed, in large 
tracts to his fa-vor-ites, with-out an-y con-sid-er-a- 
tions oth-er than those that gave him the chief 
prof-it in the trans-ac-tion. 

At an In-dian coun-cil, held in Kas-kas-ki-a in 
I 773, a com-pa-ny of Eng-lish tra-ders, who call-ed 
them-selves the *'Ill-in-ois Land Com-pa-ny," ob- 
tain-ed from the chiefs of the Kas-kas-ki-a, Ca-ho- 
ki-a, and Pe-o-ri-a tribes, two large tracts of land 
ly-ing on the east-ern side of the Mis-sis-sip-pi 
riv-er and south of the Ill-in-ois. Two years la-ter, 
a mer-chant from the Ill-in-ois coun-try, nam-ed 
Viv-i-at, come to Post Vin-cennes as the a-gent of 
an as-so-ci-a-tion call-ed the " Wa-bash Land Com- 
pa-ny." He ob-tain-ed, on be-half of his com-pa- 
ny, from e-lev-en Pi-an-ke-shaw Chiefs, a deed for 
37,497,600 a-cres of land. The deed, to make it 
sure, was sign-ed by the chiefs, and their sig-na- 
tures were at-test-ed by a num-ber of the peo-ple 
of Vin-cennes. The deed was af-ter-ward re-cord- 
ed in the of-fice of a pub-lie no-ta-ry at Kas-kas-ki-a. 

In 1772 a great fresh-et wash-ed a-way Fort 
Char-tres, and the Brit-ish gar-ri-son was trans- 
fer-reel to Fort Gage, on the bluff of the Kas-kas- 
ki-a riv-er. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS, 107 



CHAP-TER XVII. 

GEORGE ROG-ERS CLARKE IN ILL-IN-OIS. 

The rule of the Brit-ish did not prove a bless- 
ing to Ill-in-ois. Ver-y lit-tle at-ten-tion was paid 
to the growth of the coun-try. The chief ends for 
which the Wil-kins Gov-ern-ment seem-ed to ex- 
ist was to keep the In-dians qui-et, and to add to 
the wealth and ease of its chief of-fi-cers. The 
French left the coun-try one by one, and the once 
bus-yand pop-u-lous towns soon be-came de-sert-ed. 
One, on-ly, re-al-ly im-por-tant e-vent seems to have 
mark-ed this pe-ri-od of the rule of the Brit-ish 
Gov-ern-ors, and that was the es-tab-lish-ment of a 
large store at Ca-ho-ki-a, by Charles Gra-ti-ot, in 
1774. This was the first place for trade in mer- 
chan-dise o-pen-ed west of the Al-le-ghan-ies, but 
it was the fore-run-ner of man-y oth-ers. 

Gra-ti-ot, the pro-pri-e-tor, an en-ter-pris-ing 
young French-man, mar-ri-ed a daugh-ter of Pierre 
Chot-eau, the foun-der of St. Lou-is to which place 
Gra-ti-ot then re-mov-ed. 

Man-y of the French set-tiers, as well as their 
In-dian friends, who nev-er en-ter-tain-ed an-y re- 



io8 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



spect tor the Brit-ish, be-gan to grow dis-cour-ag-ed. 
They turn-ed their fa-ces West-ward, and ht-tle by 
lit-tle a stead-y ex-o-dus from Ill-in-ois set in, that 

threat-en-ed 
in a V e r - y 
short space of 
time, to turn 
this whole re- 
gion, that had 
prom-is-ed so 
fair to be the 
fruit-ful and 
de-light-ful 
home of hap- 
py pop-u-la- 
tions, in-to a 
waste and de- 
so-late place. 
A-mer-i-ca's great strug-gle for In-de-pend-ence 
from Great Brit-ain had be-gun. The chests of 
tea had been thrown in-to Bos-ton har-bor. 

The Con-ti-nen-tal Con-gress had draft-ed the 
Dec-la-ra-tion of In-de-pend-ence at Phil-a-del- 
phia, on the mem-or-a-ble 4th of Ju-ly, 1776. 
Since the days of the fa-mous Mag-na Char-ta, the 
world had not seen so orreat a state doc-u-ment as 
that same Dec-la-ra-tion of In-de-pend-ence — a 




FRENCH SET-TLERS AND IN-DIANS LEAV-ING ILL-IN-OIS. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. log 

doc-u-ment that ev-er-y Young A-mer-i-can ought 
to "read, mark, learn, and In-ward-ly di-gest." 

Dur-ing the first two years of these Rev-o-lu- 
tion-a-ry times, the set-tiers and the In-dians were 
com-par-a-tive-ly un-con-cern-ed as to the is-sues 
of the con-flict, but as the Rev-o-lu-tion pro-gress- 
ed, Brit-ish ag-i-ta-tors did all they could to stir up 
bit-ter feel-ings a-gainst the Col-o-nists. Theyas- 
sur-ed the French and In-dians that the Vir-gin-i- 
ans, in par-tic-u-lar, were a most bru-tal race of 
men. They man-u-fact-ur-ed all sorts of dis-mal 
and re-volt-ing sto-ries of their aw-ful do-ings. It 
was said they would en-terqui-et homes, and with- 
out a mo-ment's no-tice or any chance of de-fense, 
they would scalp the in-mates, and plunge their 
long knives in-to ev-er-y heart they came near. 

Gen-er-al dis-may and dread took hold up-on 
the peo-ple, and it re-quir-ed all the gen-tle pow-er 
of the priests to calm and pa-ci-fy their flocks, 
which, how-ev-er, they did to the best of their 
a-bil-i-ty, urg-ing them to en-dure and be pa-tient, 
and if the worst came to the worst, to meet their 
fate with the cour-age of men, and the he-ro-ism of 
saints. 

Just at this point, George Rog-ers Clarke, a 
na-tive of Vir-gin-i-a, who had spent much of his 
time a-mongst the west-ern tribes, and knew pret-ty 



no HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

well what their feel-ings were to-ward the Brit-ish, 
be-liev-ed that they could eas-i-ly be won o-ver to the 
A-mer-i-can cause. He felt sure that if the Brit- 
ish could be suc-cess-ful-ly driv-en from the North- 
west, there would be very lit-tle trou-ble with the 
In-dians. 

The chief points of im-por-tance were De-troit, 
Kas-kas-ki-a, and Vin-cennes, from which forts 
the Brit-ish dis-pens-ed arms. To take these forts 
was the aim and am-bi-tion of this in-trep-id young 
Vir-gin-i-an. 

Pat-rick Hen-ry, the au-thor of that fa-mous 
say-ing, ''Give me lib-er-ty, or give me death," was 
at this time, i 777, Gov-ern-or of Vir-gin-i-a. It was 
a-bout Christ-mas of this year that Clarke made 
his way to the Gov-ern-or, and laid all his plans 
be-fore him. Af-ter some con-sid-er-a-tion, Hen-ry 
wrote out a com-mis-sion, which in-struct-ed Clarke 
to raise sev-en com-pa-nies of sol-diers — 350 in 
all — to at-tack the Brit-ish force at Kas-kas-ki-a. 

The terms of the com-mis-sion em-pow-er-ed 
Clarke to of-fer the rights of cit-i-zen-ship, and the 
pro-tec-tion of the law, to all those who would yield 
loy-al-ty to the com-mon-wealth of Vir-gin-i-a. One 
gold-en sen-tence of that com-mis-sion de-serves to 
be kept in re-mem-brance, show-ing the large heart 
of the man who wrote it. In giv-ing in-struc-tions 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. iii 

Pat-rick Hen-ry ex-press-ly en-joins on Clarke a 
hu-mane meth-od of treat-ment. He writes: 

"It is ear-nest-ly de-sir-ed that you show hu- 
man-i-ty to such Brit-ish sub-jects, and oth-er per- 
sons, as fall in-to your hands." 

Arm-ed with this com-mis-sion, Clarke and his 
com-rades start-ed for Kas-kas-ki-a. And it is to 
be no-ted with in-ter-est that the 4th of Ju-ly, which 
had al-read-y be-come a red-let-ter day in A-mer-i- 
can his-to-ry, was the day on which the val-i-ant 
Vir-gin-i-ans won their blood-less vic-to-ry. 

On the e-ven-ing of July 3d, 1778, the in-hab- 
it-ants of Kas-kas-ki-a went to sleep in peace, with 
no thouo:ht or dream of what the mor-row would 
bring. In the dead of the night, Clarke's troops 
en-ter-ed the town ; the Fort had been al-read-y se- 
cur-ed. When the pan-ic-strick-en peo-ple heard 
that Clarke and his sol-diers had come, they ran 
a-bout, scream-ing in wild dis-may, **Les Long 
Cou-teaux! Les Long Cou-teaux!" The Long 
Knives! The Long Knives! 

It was now plain to Clarke, that if these af- 
fright-ed peo-ple got a-way and spread a false 
a-larm, his cause would be greatl-y harm-ed, he 
there-fore drove them back in-to their hous-es, and 
com-pell-ed them to re-main there. 

The next day a dep-u-ta-tion of the priest and 



112 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

a few of the prin-ci-pal in-hab-it-ants beg-ged of 
Clarke to al-low the peo-ple to go to church once 
more, that they might take fi-nal leave of each oth- 
er, sup-pos-ing, of course, that their end was at 
hand. Their re-quest was grant-ed ; they met in 
sol-emn wor-ship, as they fear-ed, for the last time. 
An-oth-er day pass-ed, and then they beg-ged that 
if they were to be driv-en a-way, their fam-i-lies 
might not be sep-a-ra-ted. They ex-press-ed their 
grat-i-tude for the kind-ness they had al-read-y re- 
ceiv-ed, and bow-ed low at the feet of the con- 
quer-or. 

At this, Clarke threw off all dis-guise ; he told 
priest and peo-ple that he had not come to mur-der, 
but to pro-tect them from the Brit-ish and the In- 
dians. He clos-ed his ad-dress in these words: 

''Em-brace which-ev-er side you deem best, 
and en-joy your own re-lig-ion, for A-mer-i-can law 
re-spects the be-liev-ers of ev-er-y creed, and pro- 
tects them in their rights. And now, to con-vince 
you of my sin-cer-i-ty, go and in-form the in-hab- 
it-ants that they can dis-miss their fears con-cern- 
ing their prop-er-ty and fam-i-lies ; that they can 
con-duct them-selves as u-su-al, and that their 
friends who are in con-fine-ment shall im-me-di- 
ate-ly be re-leas-ed." 

That was a glo-ri-ous day for Kas-kas-ki-a ! 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 113 

The old Cath-e-dral bell rang out in mer-ry peals. 
The priests a-pol-o-giz-ed to Col-o-nel Clarke for 
their mis-con-cep-tion of the char-ac-ter of the 
A-mer-i-cans, and a-mid the most fer-vid shouts in 
fa-vor of In-de-pend-ence, they call-ed the peo-ple 
once more to the Cath-e-dral to join in a grand 
Te De-wpfi of thanks-o^iv-in^. 

From Kas-kas-ki-a, Clarke and his men, ac- 
com-pa-ni-ed by M. Gib-ault, went to Ca-ho-ki-a, 
where the peo-ple, at first in ter-ror at the com-ing 
of ''The Long Knives," soon chang-ed their fears 
to glad-ness, and be-gan shout-ing for " Lib-er-ty 
and Free-dom." 

From Ca-ho-ki-a to Vin-cennes the con-quer- 
ors march-ed, with the good priest, Gib-ault, in 
their ranks, who, be-ing the priest of Vin-cennes as 
well as Kas-kas-ki-a, per-suad-ed that com-mu-ni- 
tv to throw off their al-le-cji-ance to the Brit-ish. 
and join the com-mon-wealth of Vir-gin-i-a. 

Three sol-diers were sent to Pe-o-ri-a Lake to 
tell the set-tiers there of the change of Gov-ern- 
ment. The on-ly in-hab-it-ants res-i-dent at this 
point were French, In-dians, and half-breeds. No' 
Eng-lish was spo-ken in Pe-o-ri-a up to this date, 
and no ob-jec-tion was of-fer-ed to the change of 
Gov-ern-ment. 

Who would have thought, in that ear-ly day, 



114 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



that that ht-tle group of log hous-es with here and 
there a vine-yard, then a church, and last of all a 
wind-mill, would have grown in-to the beau-ti-ful 
and flour-ish-ing city of the Pe-o-ri-a of to-day! 

The news of Clarke's in-va-sion reach-ed Ham- 
il-ton, the Brit-ish Gen-er-al, at De-troit, who re- 
sol v-ed at once up-on an ef-fort to re-cap-ture Vin- 




THE CIT-Y OF PE-0 RI-A. 



cennes, and in the Au-tumn of 1778, he set out 
for that pur-pose with a force of Brit-ish, French 
Can-a-di-ans, and In-dians, 480 strong. The gar- 
ri-son at Vin-cennes now con-sist-ed of the brave 
com-man-der. Helm, and one pri-vate sol-dier. 
When Ham-il-ton came near the fort with his 
mot-ley for-ces. Helm stood in the gate-way be- 
side a load-ed can-non. Ham-il-ton not know-ing 
the ex-tent of Helm's for-ces, prom-is-ed the hon- 
ors of war if the fort sur-ren-der-ed. And on the 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 113 

14th of De-cem-ber, 1778, Cap-tain Helm and the 
one pri-vate march-ed out ! 

Col-o-nel Clarke could not rest with Vin-cennes 
in the hands of the en-em-y, so, with 175 faith-ful 
fol-low-ers, he set out on the 7th of Feb-ru-a-ry, 
1779, to re-cap-ture the cap-tur-ed fort. His jour- 
ney was a try-ing one, and his meth-od of deal-ing 
with the gar-ri-son was most ro-man-tic. On Wash- 
ing-ton's birth-day, Feb-ru-a-ry 2 2d, the gar-ri-son 
ca-pit-u-la-ted ; so end-ed the Rev-o-lu-tion-a-ry 
War, so far as Ill-in-ois was con-cern-ed. 



CHAP-TER XVHI. 

ILL-IN-OIS PART OF THE NORTH-WEST TER-RI-TO-RY. 

The Gen-er-al As-sem-bly of Vir-gin-i-a con- 
sti-tu-ted the new-ly con-quer-ed coun-try, cov-er- 
ing all the lands north-west of the O-hi-o riv-er, 
in-to ''The Coun-ty of Ill-in-ois." This was the 
larg-est coun-ty in the world, spread-ing o-ver a 
sur-face much lar-ger than that oc-cu-pi-ed by three 
or four Eu-ro-pe-an King-doms. It in-clud-ed 
what are now the States of Ohio, In-di-an-a, Ill- 
in-ois, Mich-i-gan, and Wis-con-sin, an a-rea of 
more than 250,000 square miles. 



ii6 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



This im-mense tract of coun-try was sep-a-ra- 
ted from Vir-gin-i-a, and ced~ed to the U-ni-ted 
States in 1784. Thom-as Jef-fer-son, Thom-as 
Lee, James Mon-roe, and Sam-uel Har~dy, were 




STEAM-BOAT ON THE MIS-SIS-SIP-PI. 



the del-e-gates from Con-gress to com-plete the ar- 



range-ments. 



The laws pro-vid-ed tor the gov-ern-ment of 
this great ter-ri-to-ry, call-ed by some "The Com- 
pact of 1787," were few and sim-ple. Pro-vi-sion 
was made for the am-ple rep-re-sen-ta-tion of the 
peo-ple, and for the fu-ture di-vi-sion of the ter-ri- 
to-ry in-to not less than three, and not more than 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 117 

five, States. The sev-enth law of the code prac- 
ti-cal-ly pro-hib-it-ed slav-er-y. Slaves broug-ht in- 
to the re-fjion had to siijn an a-erree-ment to work 
for their mas-ters a cer-tain time. As a mat-ter of 
fact, this vast em-pire, the heart of this great val- 
ley of the Mis-sis-sip-pi, was con-se-cra-ted to Free- 
dom. There had been slav-er-y in the south-ern 
part of the ''Coun-ty" be-fore the en-act-ment of 
the great "Com-pact ;" but the airs that blew o-ver 
the lakes and riv-ers, the for-ests and prair-ies, of 
Ill-in-ois, were the strong pure airs of lib-er-ty. 

The cap-i-tal of the new-ly or-gan-ized ter-ri- 
to-ry was fix-ed at Mar-i-et-ta, in the State of 
O-hi-o, and re-main-ed there un-til the ter-ri-to-ry 
was di-vi-ded. On the 5th of Oc-to-ber, 1787, 
Ar-thur St. Clan*, an of-fi-cer of the Rev-o-lu-tion- 
a-ry War, was ap-point-ed the first Gov-ern-or. 

The In-dians con-tin-ued to be trou-ble-some, 
though Gov-ern-or St. Clair did all he could to 
form am-ic-a-ble treat-ies with the va-ri-ous tribes. 
But the dis-sen-sions that ex-ist-ed be-tween the 
va-ri-ous tribes made such work more and more 
dif-fi-cult. It is said that be-tween 1783 and i 790, 
not less than 1,500 Whites were mur-der-ed, or in 
some oth-er way spir-it-ed a-way from their homes 
and set-tle-ments in the North-west. 

On the 4th of No-vem-ber, 1791, a sad and 



ii8 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

blood-y fray took place in a deep ra-vine on the 
Wa-bash riv-er, led on by Lit-tle Tur-tle. In 
this bat-tie 900 were kill-ed. 

An-oth-er ver-y des-per-ate bat-tie was fought at 
Mau-mee, un-der com-mand of Gen-er-al Wayne, 
on the 20th of Au-gust, 1794, in which the In- 
dians were thor-ough-ly rout-ed. 

In 1798, Gov-ern-or St. Clair is-sued an or-der 
for an e-lec-tion of Rep-re-sen-ta-tives. Two years 
la-ter, in the first year of the Nine-teenth Cen-tu- 
ry, the North-west Ter-ri-to-ry was di-vi-ded in-to 
the ter-ri-to-ries of O-hi-o and In-diana — our pres- 
ent State be-long-ing to the lat-ter^ — of which Will- 
iam Hen-ry Har-ri-son, af-ter-wards Pres-i-dent of 
the U-ni-ted States, and wide-ly known as ''Tip- 
pe-ca-noe Har-ri-son," was made Gov-ern-or. The 
seat of Gov-ern-ment was ait Vin-cennes. 

Col-o-ni-za-tion did not move very rap-id-ly in 
the north-ern part of what is now the State of 111- 
in-ois, but the south-ern por-tions were quick-ly 
fill-ing up. 

Bap-tiste, and a few others, had fix-ed their 
homes at the mouth of the Chi-ca-go riv-er. They 
were tra-ders rath-er than set-tiers, de-pend-ing for 
a liv-ing whol-ly on trad-ing with the In-dians. 

In 1804, Fort Dear-born was e-rect-ed by the 
Gov-ern-ment, and was so nam-ed in hon-or of 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



iig 



Har-ry Dear-born, who was at that time Sec-re- 
ta-ry of War. 

In 1805, Mich-i-gan, which at that time in- 
cki-ded the pres-ent State of Wis-con-sin and a 
part of 
M in-ne- 
so-ta, was 
sep-a-rat- 
ed from 
the ter-ri- 
to-ry of 
I n - d i - a- 
n a , and 
the ques- 
tion then 
a-rose, as 

\C\ \Kj\\^\\\ VIEW OF FORT DEAR- BORN, FROM THE RIV-ER. 

er it would not be a good thing to make a sep-a-rate 
di-vi-sion of Ill-in-ois. The bat-tie of the Sep-a-ra- 
tion-ists with their foes, was waged for four years, 
and in 1809, the sep-a-ra-tion took place, and Ill- 
in-ois was known as Ill-in-ois Ter-ri-to-ry, with the 
seat of gov-ern-ment at Kas-kas-ki-a. Atthistmie 
the set-tiers in Ill-in-ois num-ber-ed a-bout 11,500. 
Nin-i-an Ed-wards was the first Gov-ern-or of 
the new Ter-ri-to-ry. But he had hard-ly en-ter-ed 
up-on the du-ties of his of-fice be-fore the rest-less 




120 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

In-dians be-gan their sly, cru-el work. Small 
bands of them would skulk a-bout and take the 
mean-est ad-van-tage of the help-less and the un- 
arm-ed. 

Te-cum-seh, Chief of the Shaw-nee tribe, had 
tried to en-list the Creeks, the Choc-taws, and the 
Chic-a-saws, a-gainst the set-tiers. Gov-ern-or 
Har-ri-son thought this a good time to take a stand, 
so he set out for.Tip-pe-ca-noe, or Proph-et's Town, 
where he found the In-dians were un-der the com- 
mand of the One-Eyed Pro-phet. The bat-tie of 
Tip-pe-ca-noe was fought on the 6th of No-vem- 
ber, i8i I, in which the In-dians were o-ver-thrown. 

Gov-ern-or Ed-wards call-ed a coun-cil of In- 
dian Chiefs at Ca-ho-ki-a, in 1812. To this strange 
con-fer-ence came Go-mo, Pep-per, White Hair, 
Lit-tle Sauk, Great Speak-er, Yel-low Sun, Snake, 
Bull, Ig-nace, Pipe Bird, Cut Branch, the South 
Wind, Black Bird, Blue Eyes, Sun Fish, and a 
host of oth-ers with e-qual-ly strange names. They 
jis-ten-ed to all Gov-ern-or Ed-wards said, and the 
next day. Go-mo re-pli-ed. But there was no dis- 
po-si-tion on the part of the In-dians, for peace; 
they were sly and de-ceit-ful, and were chief-ly 
anx-i-ous to gain time. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 121 



CHAP-TER XIX. 

THE MAS-SA-CRE AT FORT DEAR-BORN. 

When Har-ry Dear-born, Sec-re-ta-ry of War, 
saw the fort ris-ing on the bank of the Chic-a-go 
riv-er, that was to bear his name, he no more 
dream-ed of the aw-ful trag-e-dy that was to take 
place there in five or six years, than he did of the 
fact, that this same spot would, in much less than 
a cen-tu-r}^ be-come the cen-tre of a com-mer-cial 
and so-cial life, whose in-flu-ence would reach all 
round the world. 

In the sum-merof the mem-o-ra-ble year, 181 2, 
Cap-tain Heald, who came to Chic-a-go from Ken- 
tuck-y, with his young bride, each rid-ing on a 
beau-ti-ful bay po-ny, was in com-mand of Fort 
Dear-born. He had with him sev-en-ty-five men, 
full-y half of whom were un-fit for du-ty by rea-son 
of sick-ness. 

The sec-ond war with Great Brit-ain was in 
pro-gress, and the Brit-ish were do-ing all in their 
pow-er to win the In-dians to their side. But the 
In-dians and half-breeds ap-pear-ed to be on per- 
fect-ly friend-ly terms with the set-tiers on the 



122 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



Chic-a-eo riv-er, and with the sol-diers at Fort 
Dear-born. But treach-ery was at work. 

One e-ven-ing Mr. Kin-zie sat play-ing on his 
vi-o-hn, and his chil-dren were danc-ing to the 




. FORT DEAR-BORN. E-RECT-ED 1804. 

mu-sic, when a sud-den cry was heard: "The In- 
dians! The In-dians!" It was ru-mor-ed that 
up at Lee's the In-dians were kill-ing and scalp- 
ing. Where-up-on, Mr. Kin-zie and his fam-i-ly, 
and the rest of the set-tiers, cross-ed the riv-er and 
took ref-uee in Fort Dear-born. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS, 123 

A lit-tle la-ter In the year, or-ders came from 
Gen-er-al Hull to Cap-tain Heald, to e-vac-u-ate 
Fort Dear-born and escape to Fort Wayne. His 
or-der ran thus : 

"Leave the fort and stores as they are, and let 
the In-dians make dis-tri-bu-tion for them-selves, 
and while they are en-gag-ed in bus-i-ness the white 
peo-ple may es-cape to Fort Wayne." 

It has al-ways been thought that this or-der 
was a great mis-take ; the sub-or-di-nate of-fi-cers 
op-pos-ed it, but Heald was firm, and de-sir-ing to 
be thor-ough-ly frank, he call-ed a con-fer-ence. 
It was un-der-stood that all the arms, am-mu-ni- 
tion, and li-quor in the fort, were to be left for the 
In-dians to di-vide a-mong them-selves, and they 
in turn were to furnish a safe es-cort to Fort Wayne. 
The of-fi-cers a-gain re-mon-stra-ted. "Give these 
men arms," they said, "and then fire their brains 
with li-quor, and they will turn up-on us, and kill 
and scalp ev-er-y one of us." The treat-y was se- 
cret-ly broken, the li-quor was pour-ed in-to the 
riv-er, the am-mu-ni-tion and arms w^ere thrown 
down a well. 

The break-ing of the treat-y was dis-cov-er-ed 
by the In-dians, and they se-cret-ly pre-pai-ed for 
ven-o^eance. 

On the morn-ing of Au-gust 15th, 18 12, the 



124 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

rar-ri-son march-ed out with' drums beat-inor and 
ban-ners fly-ing, for Fort Wayne. Cap-tain Heald 
and his wife rode in front on their bay po-nies. 
Then came the mem-bers of the gar-ri-son, and the 
troops, fol-low-ed by wag-ons con-tain-ing the wo- 
men and the chil-dren, and the sick. Last of all 
came 500 In-dians claim-ing to be an es-cort. 

Cap-tain Wells, rode a-head, and a-bout two 
miles out, on the lake shore, he saw the In-dians 
form-ing in front. He rode back in hot haste, and 
told Cap-tain Heald that there was dan-ger. In- 
stant-ly the wag-ons were ar-rang-ed so as to pro- 
tect the sick and help-less, and to serve the pur- 
pose of breast-works, be-hind which the gar-ri-son 
gath-er-ed for de-fense. 

Then fol-low-ed one of the sad-dest mas-sa-cres 
ev-er re-cord-ed. Cap-tain Heald and his wife 
were sep-a-ra-ted ear-ly in the fight. The In-dians 
o-pen-ed fire, and the white troops charg-ed up-on 
them and drove them back to the prair-ie. There 
were fif-ty-four sol-diers, twelve ci-vil-i-ans, and 
four wo-men, a-gainst 500 In-dian War-ri-ors. 

Cap-tain Wells, who was un-cle to Mrs. Heald, 
rode up be-side her and said : 

"We have not the slio^ht-est chance for life. 
We must part to meet no more in this world. 
Good bye, dear; God bless you!" 




DOUG-LAS MON-U-MENT, CHIC-A-GO. NEAR THE SCENE OF THE FORT 
DEAR-BORN MAS-SA-CRE. I25 



126 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

At this point Gap-tain Wells saw a young In- 
dian de-mon climb into a wag-on where there 
were twelve chil-dren, and the in-hu-man sav-age 
tom-a-hawk-ed them all ! This stir-red the blood 
to fire in the Cap-tain's heart. 

"If that is your game," he said. " butch-er-ing 
wo-men and chil-dren, I will kill too." 

With that he spur-red his horse in the di-rec- 
tion of the camp where the In-dians had left their 
squaws and pap-oos-es. With fiend-ish yells the 
In-dians followed ; they shot his horse from un-der 
him, he him-self was bad-ly wound-ed, but in this 
wild me-lee he is said to have kill-ed eight In- 
dians. Bleed-ing and almost life-less he was 
drag-ged in-to the pres-ence of Mrs. Heald, where 
he was scalp-ed and his heart cut out, which was 
then slic-ed in-to a doz-en piec-es, and eat-en while 
it was yet warm, by these in-sa-ti-ate sav-a-ges. 

All were mas-sa-cred but twen-ty-sev-en, who 
be-came pris-on-ers of war. Mr. Heald was cap- 
tured by one par-ty, and Mrs. Heald by an-oth-er. 
They were de-liv-er-ed to the Brit-ish at Mack-i- 
naw, but sub-se-quent-ly gain-ed their lib-er-ty. 
The on-ly land-mark that points out the scene of 
this aw-ful con-flict, is a large cot-ton-wood tree 
now stand-ing on i8th street, Chic-a-go, be-tween 
Prair-ie Av-e-nue and the lake. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 727 



CHAP-TER XX. 

ILL-IN-OIS BE-COMES A STATE PI-0-NEER DAYS. 

In 18 1 8 Ill-in-ois be-came one of the States of 
the U-nl-on. Its first Con-sti-tu-tion-al As-sem- 
bly was held at Kas-kas-ki-a, in Ju-ly, 1818. In 
Sep-tem-ber of the same year, Shad-rach Bond, of 
St. Clair, was e-lect-ed as the first Gov-ern-or of 
the State of Ill-in-ois, with Pierre Me-nard, of 
Ran-dolph, as Lieu-ten-ant-Gov-ern-or. These 
e-lec-tions were made with-out con-test. 

We have now reach-ed the be-gin-ning of those 
vig-or-ous ro-man-tic times, known as "The Pi-o- 
neer Days." 

There are hun-dreds of el-der-ly men and wo- 
men liv-ing to-day in Ill-in-ois who have per-fect 
re-mem-brance of the sturdy pi-o-neer days. The 
sto-ries they tell of those try-ing times are full of 
ro-mance and he-ro-ism. They tell of the days 
when pi-o-neers wa-ded through deep snows, more 
than a score of miles to mill or mar-ket. More 
time was of-ten ta-ken up in go-ing to mar-ket and 
re-turn-ing home than is now re-quir-ed to cross 
the con-ti-nent, or to go to Eu-rope and back. 



128 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



When ^he pi-o-neer and his fam-I-ly ar-riv-ed in 
their straj.i^e and cum-ber-some wag-ons, not in- 
apt-ly de-scriL> ed as " Prair-ie Schoon-ers," the first 
thino^ to set a-boc:t was the bui!d-ino^ of a cab-in. 
While this was be-ing done, the fam-i-ly slept in 




AN EM-I-GRANT TRAIN CROSS-ING THE PRAIR-IE, 

the wag-ons or on the grass, while the hor-ses and 
mules, teth-er-ed to pre-vent es-cape, graz-ed on 
the grass a-round them. Trees of a suit-a-ble size 
were se-lect-ed, fell-ed, and pre-par-ed for their 
pla-ces. The day for the rais-ing was an-nounc-ed, 
and then, from far and near, the neigh-bors came 
to as-sist the strang-er in get-ting a home. These 



IJO 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



rais-ing 




>ees" were ver-y of-ten times of great 
mer-ri-ment. The struc-ture went up a log at a 
time, and soon the frame-work was read-y for the 

clap-board roof, 
which was held on 
by huge weight 
poles. Pla-ces for 
doors and win- 
dows were then 
cut, the chim-ney 
was built, and 
then the cab-in 
was ready for oc- 
cu-pa-tion. Oth- 
er mat-ters of de-tail fol-low-ed. The spa-ces be- 
tween the logs were fill-ed in with split sticks of 
wood call-ed ^'chinks" and then daub-ed o-ver, both 
in-side and out, with mor-tar made of clay. The 
floor was of-ten noth-ing more than earth, tramp-led 
hard and smooth. Some-times a wood-en floor 
was found made of split logs, with the split side 
turn-ed up-ward. 

For a fire-place, a space was cut out of the 
wall on one side of the room, u-su-al-ly a-bout six 
feet in length, and three sides were built up of 
logs, ma-king an off-set in the wall. This was 
lin-ed with stone, where stone was plen-ti-ful, but 




STAGE COACH OF THE OLD DAYS. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. iji 

where stone was scarce, earth was us-ed. The flue 

or up-per part of the chim-ney was built of small 

split sticks, two and 

a half or three feet 

in length, car-ri-ed 

a lit-tle way a-bove 

the roof, and plas- 

ter-ed o-ver with 

clay, and when fin- 

ish-ed this was call-ed a "cob and clay" chim-ney. 

The door space was made by cut-ting a hole 
in one side of the room of the re-quir-ed size, the 
door it-self being made of clap-boards se-cur-ed by 
wood-en pins to two cross-pieces. The hing-es 
were also of wood, while the fas-ten-ings con-sist- 
ed of a wood-en latch catch-ing on a hook of the 
same ma-ter-i-al. To open the door from the out- 
side, a strip of buck-skin was tied to the latch, and 
drawn through a hole a few inch-es a-bove the 
latch-bar, so that on pull-ing the string the latch 
was lift-ed from the catch or hook, and the door 
was o-pened with-out fur-ther troub-le. To lock 
the door it was on-ly ne-ces-sa-ry to pull the string 
through the hole to the in-side. Here the fam-i-ly 
liv-ed, and here the guest and the wan-der-er were 
made wel-come. 

The fur-ni-ture of these low-ly homes, if not of 



132 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



el-e-gant de-sign, was of tough and en-dur-ing fii- 
bre. Ta-bles, bed-steads and chairs were hewn 
from the for-est trees. The box-es and bar-rels 




FA-CING A PRAIR-IE STORM. 



that brought their sup-pHes serv-ed as ma-ter-i-al 
for cup-boards and bu-reaus, for loung-es and 
shelves. And to this dav there are rel-ics of this 
prim-i-tive fur-ni-ture, here and there, to be found, 
that re-flect the high-est cred-it on the in-ge-nu-i-ty 
and skill of the un-daunt-ed set-tiers of Ill-in-ois. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 133 

In these days the chil-dren far-ed but rough-ly. 
They were not clad in fan-cy cos-tumes, nor fed on 
dain-ties, and when night came they were stow-ed 
a-way in low, dark at-tics, of-ten a-mongst the horns 
of the elk and the deer, and ver-y of-ten they were 
able, through the wide chinks in the clap-boards, 
to watch the twink-ling stars. These were days 
of hard and al-most cease-less work. The hours 
of la-bor were from sun-rise to sun-set, and in the 
win-ter time the work of-ten tres-pass-ed far in-to 
the niofht. 

The cloth-ing of these ear-ly- pi-o-neers was in 
keep-ing with the sim-plic-i-ty of their homes. 
Ne-ces-si-ty com-pell-ed them to be ver-y care-ful. 
They were thank-ful when the cloth-ing was good 
and warm. ''Dress" and "style" did not con- 
cern them. In sum-mer near-ly all per-sons, both 
male and fe-male, went bare-foot-ed. Buck-skin 
moc-ca-sins were much worn. Boys of twelve 
and fif-teen nev-er thought of wear-ing any-thing 
on their feet, ex-cept dur-ing the cold-est months 
of the year. Boots and shoes came with oth-er 
lux-u-ries of grow-ing pros-per-i-ty. The pi-o-neer 
farm-er was a man who had to work with stead-y 
pa-tience that nev-er dream-ed of giv-ing in. And 
not he a-lone, but his sons and daugh-ters, and 
e-ven his wife had to take full share of the cease-less 



r34 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



toil. The prair-ie had to be bro-ken. The earth 
was rich, but plow-ing and sow-ing must come, 
be-fore the har-vest could be gar-ner-ed. And the 
plow-ing, and the sow-ing, and the reap-ing must 
all be done by hand. The skill of the in-ven-tor 







THE PI-O-NEER FARM-ER, FIF-TY YEARS A-GO. 

had not yet found its way in-to the fields. But 
things have great-ly chang-ed. All the ro-mance 
of the old har-vest days has gone. The march of 
in-ven-tion has turn-ed all the po-e-try to prose. 
We shall nev-er hear the old song again — 

"Hur-rah for the ra-kers! 

And the mer-ry hay-ma-kers! 
And hur-rah for the mid-sum-mer sky!" 

The ra-kers are no more ! The mer-ry hay-ma- 
kers have be-come ma-chines ! And all that is left 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



^35 



US, is the o-dor of the hay, and the beau-ti-ful 
mid-sum-mer sky. 

These farm-hous-es, and ''Cab-in homes of 
Ill-in-ois," were in-hab-it-ed by a race of hard-work- 
ing, gen-er- 
o Li s , k i n d - 
heart-ed peo- 
ple. Love 
s m i 1 - e d in 
these lowly 
dwell-ino^sas 
sure-ly as in 
the pal-a-ces 
of Y 



v 1 n g s . 



^V - 




A PRAIR-IE HAR-VEST FIELD IN 1 888. 



The ear-ly 

home life of 

the prair-ies, 

so gen-u-ine, 

so cord-i-al, so sin-cere, has rear-ed and nur-tur-ed 

a race of men and wo-men of whom the State of 

Ill-in-ois, and A-mer-i-ca at large, has just oc-ca-sion 

to be proud. The kind of men, of whom the po-et 

Low-ell, says: **They have em-pires in their 

brains;" just the kind of men to build up a glo- 

ri-ous fu-ture for Ill-in-ois. 



136 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



CHAP-TER XXI. 

THE YOUNG STATE MAKES WON-DER-FUL PRO-GRESS. 

The State of Ill-in-ois is a gar-den four hun- 
dred miles long, and one hun-dred and fif-ty miles 
wide. Its soil is a black, sand-y loam, va-ry-ing 
from six inch-es to six-ty feet thick. This glor-i- 
ous Prair-ie State has with-in her-self the el-e-ments 
of all great-ness. She grows near-ly ev-er-y green 
thing to be found in tem-per-ate and trop-i-cal 
zones. It is de-clar-ed that near-ly four-fifths of 
the en-tire State is un-der-laid with a de-pos-it of 
coal, more than for-ty feet thick on the av-er-age. 
At the pres-ent rate of con-sump-tion, the coal in 
Ill-in-ois will last 120,000 years. 

But the ma-te-ri-al wealth of a State is on-ly a 
part of her wealth. Her Ed-u-ca-tion-al ad-van- 
tages form one of the most im-por-tant of all the 
el-e-ments of her wealth. 

Great hon-or is due to Judge Pope, who mov- 
ed for a per-cent-age of all lands sold, to be 
de-vo-ted to the ed-u-ca-tion of the young. 
A-mer-i-ca has al-ways been anx-i-ous that her sons 
and daugh-ters should be well hous-ed, well clad, 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



^37 



well fed, and well taught. And the State of 
Ill-in-ois has not lag-ged be-hind a hair's-breadth in 
this ver-y laud-a-ble am-bi-tion. 

The old log school house of the pi-o-neer days 
was not ver-y or-nate. 



But it was a grand thing 







SCHOOL HOUSE OF THE PI-O-NEER DAYS. 



to see, spring-ing up on ev-er-y hill-side and dot- 
ting the prair-ies here and there, these mod-est 
homes of in-struc-tion. 

The or-di-nance of 1787 con-se-cra-ted one-thir- 
ty-sixth of her soil to com-mon schools, and the law 



1^8 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

of 1818, the first law that went up-on her stat-utes, 
gave three per cent of all the rest to ed-u-ca-tion. 

The seat of gov-ern-ment was re-mov-ed from 
Kas-kas-ki-a to Van-da-li-a, and there the sec-ond 
as-sem-bly of the State Leg-is-la-ture was con-ven- 
ed on the 4th of De-cem-ber, 1820. 

Ill-in-ois now be-gan to fill up with great ra- 
pid-i-ty. Em-i-grants from all lands flock-ed to 
the fruit-ful West. Eu-ro-pe-an coun-tries were 
steep-ed in pov-er-ty through the e-nor-mous war 
debts that had been con-tract-ed. And thou-sands 
of earn-est, in-dus-tri-ous peo-ple, who were dis- 
cour-ag-ed at the pros-pects that lay be-fore them, 
turn-ed their fac-es hope-ful-ly to the Gold-en 
West. 

In the year 182 1, the Leg-is-la-ture of Ill-in-ois 
was a-ble to add sev-en new coun-ties to the nine- 
teen al-read-y form-ed, name-ly: Fay-ette, Mont- 
gom-ery, Greene, Sang-a-mon, Pike, Law-rence, 
and Ham-il-ton. 

In 1822, Mr. Ed-ward Coles was e-lect-ed 
Gov-ern-or, and A-dol-phus S. Hub-bard, Lieu- 
ten-ant-Gov-ern-or. Gov-ern-or Coles was a brave, 
un-com-pro-mis-ing foe of slav-er-y. He had o-rig- 
i-nal-ly been a plan-ter in Vir-gin-i-a. When he 
mov-ed to Ill-in-ois he e-man-ci-pa-ted his slaves, 
giv-ing to each a piece of land that they might call 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. ijg 

their own. Most of his of-fi-cial ca-reer was de- 
vo-ted to the slav-er-y ques-tion. 

In 1825 Gen-e-ral La-fay-ette, the friend of 
Wash-ing-ton, vis-it-ed Ill-in-ois. He was giv-en 
a most flat-ter-ing re-cep-tion at Kas-kas-ki-a and 
Shaw-nee-town. He ht-er-al-ly walk-ed up-on a 
path-way of flow-ers, strewn by the hands of mer- 
ry Ht-tle maid-ens. 

Nin-i-an Ed-wards was el-ect-ed Gov-ern-or in 
1826, with Will-i-am Kin-ney as Lieu-ten-ant 
Gov-ern-or. These were suc-ceed-ed in 1830 by 
John Rey-nolds, for Gov-ern-or, and Za-dok Ca- 
sey, for Lieu-ten-ant Gov-ern-or. 



CHAP-TER XXH. 

THE BLACK HAWK WAR. 

This mem-or-a-ble con-flict a-rose from the fail- 
ure of Black Hawk to a-bide by the con-tracts in- 
to which he had free-ly en-ter-ed. A large tract 
of land was bought from the Sacs and Fox-es by 
the Gov-ern-ment, in 1804, Gen-er-al Har-ri-son 
con-duct-ing the treat-y. In a con-fer-ence with 
Gov-ern-or Ed-wards, in 181 5, this treat-y was 
con-firmed by Black Hawk, a Chief of the Sacs, 
and by Ke-o-kuk. 



j^fo HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

In 1830, the dep-re-da-tions of the Sacs and 
Fox-es had reach-ed such a pitch that they were 
or-der-ed to re-main west of the Mis-sis-s'p-pi. 
Black Hawk grew res-tive, and de-clar-ed him-self 
in re-bell-ious terms. He said the chiefs who 
sign-ed the treat-y were first made drunk, and then 
were per-suad-ed to sign the treat-y with-out know- 
ing what it meant. 

All this was de-ni-ed by Ke-o-kuk, who de-clar- 
ed the treat-y was just, and re-fus-ed to join Black 
Hawk in his re-bell-ion. 

But Black Hawk was res-o-lute, and on the 
14th of May, 1832, he ap-pear-ed on the east-ern 
bank of the Mis-sis-sip-pi with 300 war-ri-ors. A 
large force was at once thrown in-to the field, and 
Black Hawk was de-feat-ed. On the 24th of June 
Black Hawk was a-gain re-puls-ed by Ma-jor De- 
mont, be-tween Rock riv-er and Ga-le-na. The 
troops con-tin-u-ed to move up the Rock riv-er, and 
on the 2ist of Ju-ly an-oth-er en-gage-ment took 
place near the Blue Mounds, and Black Hawk 
was a-gain de-feat-ed. The fall-en Chief, with 
twen-ty of his braves, fled up the Wis-con-sin riv-er. 
But they were cap-tur-ed by the Win-ne-ba-goes, 
who, anx-i-ous of se-cur-ing the friend-ship of the 
Whites, de-liv-er-ed them in-to the hands of Gen- 
er-al Street, the U-ni-ted States In-dian A-gent. 




BLACK HAWK. 



141 



142 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

They were then ta-ken to Wash-ing-ton and made 
pris-on-ers in For-tress Mon-roe. 

Af-ter a time Black Hawk was re-leas-ed. He 
went to Des Moines, Iowa, where he built a home, 
and de-vo-ted him-self to farm-ing, hunt-ing and 
fish-ing. He died on the 3d of Oc-to-ber, 1838, 
and was bur-i-ed in a grave six feet deep, in a sit- 
ting pos-ture. He wore a suit of clothes giv-en 
him by the Pres-i-dent while in Wash-ing-ton, 
and his right hand rest-ed up-on a cane giv-en him 
by Hen-ry Clay, which he wish-ed to have bur-i-ed 
with him. 



CHAP-TER XXHI. 

SHAB-BO-NA, A FRIEND-LY IN-DIAN. 

Ter-ri-ble, re-lent-less and bit-ter, as was the 
en-mi-ty of man-y of the In-dians to the white set- 
tlers, there were some praise-worth-y ex-cep-tions. 

One of the most hon-or-ed of all the In-dians 
of Ill-in-ois, of this pe-ri-od, was Shab-bo-na, who 
was born at an In-dian vil-lage on the Kan-ka-kee 
riv-er, in the year 1775. He liv-ed to the extreme 
age of 83 years, dy-ing at Sen-e-ca, in Grundy 
Coun-ty, on the 17th of Ju-ly, 1859. He was the 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



H3 



true friend of the white man, and throusrh him 
man-y of the ear-ly set-tiers of Ill-in-ois owe the 
pres-er-va-tion of hfe and prop-er-ty. He made 
en-em-ies a-mongst his own people, be-cause of 
his friend-ship for the white peo-ple. It is more 
than prob-a-ble that but for his gen-er-ous warn-ing, 
hun-dreds of men and wo-men would have fall-en 
vic-tims to the tom-a-hawks of mer-ci-less and in- 
hu-man brutes. Black Hawk him-self said, when 
a pris-on-er, that had it not been for Shab-bo-na, 
the whole Pott-a-wat-o-mie 
tribe would have join-ed 
his stand-ard, and he could 
have con-tin-u-ed the war 
for years. 

By guard-ing the lives of 
the Whites he en-dang-er- 
ed his own, for the Sacs 
and Fox-es threat-en-ed to 
kill him, and made two at- 
tempts to car-ry out their 
threats. They kill-ed Py- 
pe-o-gee his son, and Pyps 
his ne-phew, and hunt-ed 
him as if he had been a 
wild beast of the for-est. In his old age he was 
rob-bed of his twosec-tions of land, be-cause he had 




SHAB-BO-NA. 



144 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

gone west for a short time. But such was the re- 
spect in which he was held, that the cit-i-zens of 
Ot-ta-wa raised mon-ey and bought him a tract of 
land on the Ill-in-ois riv-er, on which they built 
him a house, and sup-pli-ed him with the means of 
liv-ing. He had a peace-ful old age, and was 
bur-i-ed with great pomp in the cem-e-ter-y at 
Mor-ris. His squaw was drown-ed five years af- 
ter-wards, in Ma-zen Creek, Grun-dy Coun-ty, and 
was bur-i-ed by the side of her hon-or-ed and aged 
hus-band. 



CHAP-TER XXIV. 

STIR-RING TRAG-IC DAYS. 

In the fall of 1834 Jo-seph Dun-can was e-lect- 
ed Gov-ern-or, and Alex-an-der M. Jen-kins, Lieu- 
ten-ant Gov-ern-or. Set-tiers flock-ed in-to Ill-in- 
ois by hun-dreds. Peace had been made with the 
In-dian tribes, and there seem-ed to be ev-er-y 
pros-pect of good times. Pub-lie im-prove-ments 
were made on a large scale. The Ill-in-ois and 
Mich-i-gan Ca-nal scheme was put in mo-tion. 
Pro-vis-ions were made for rail-roads to be built 
from Ga-le-na to the O-hi-o, from Al-ton to Shaw- 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



145 



nee-town, from Quin-cy through Spring-field to 
the Wa-bash riv-er, and from Pe-o-ri-a to War- 
saw. The Kas-kas-ki-a, the Lit-de Wa-bash, the 
Ill-in-ois and the Rock riv-ers were to be thor- 
ough-ly dredg-ed. 

Of Chic-a-go, the most won-der-ful city of this 
mod-ern age, we shall have to speak more at length 




CHIC-A-GO IN 1833. 



la-ter on. What Chic-a-go look-ed like in 1833, 
we may gath-er from the a-bove il-lus-tra-tion. 

In 1836, and in De-cem-ber of that year, the 
Tenth Gen-er-al As-sem-bly was held at Van-da- 
lia, and to this great gath-er-ing came two of the 



146 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

great-est men Ill-in-ois has ev-er seen — A-bra-ham 
Lin-coln and Ste-phen A. Doug-las. 

A-bout this time, by a mu-tu-al a-gree-ment, 
the Pott-a-wat-o-mies, the last of the In-dian tribes, 
pass-ed a-way from Ill-in-ois. They came once a 
year to Chic-a-go, and re-ceiv-ed their an-nu-i-ty of 
$30,000, in goods, for the land they had sold, and 
now, af-ter a con-fer-ence of two weeks, they sold 
all their lands east of the Mis-sis-sip-pi, and cross- 
ing to the west-ern shore of that might-y riv-er, they 
left their na-tive hunt-mg grounds for-ev-er. 

Thom-as Car-lin was the next Gov-ern-or, ?nd 
S. H. An-der-son his Lieu-ten-ant, e-lect-ed in 
1838. After a long and fierce con-test the Cap-i- 
tal was re-mov-ed from Van-da-li-a to Spring-field, 
in 1839. 

The ques-tion of slav-er-y was now be-gin-ning 
to ag-i-tate the whole co'un-try, and Ill-in-ois was 
soon deep-ly in-ter-est-ed in the mat-ter; and it is 
a sad thing to have to tell, but so strong and deep 
was the feel-ing, that one of the best of men was 
mur-der-ed for his o-pin-ions. The Rev. E-li-jah 
P. Love-joy start-ed a pa-per in St. Lou-is, in which 
he spoke very strong-ly a-gainst slav-er-y. He 
found that in or-der to be safe he must move from 
St. Lou-is; so he went to Al-ton, where he spoke 
e-ven-ly more strong-ly and de-ci-ded-ly a-gainst 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



147 



the ter-ri-ble wrong. The an-ger of the slav-er-y 
par-ty knew no bounds. Three of his press-es 
were de-stroy-ed, and in en-deav-or-ing to de-fend 
a fourth, in com-pa-ny with a num-ber of his 




^5>^-si^' 



STATE HOUSE, SPRING-FIELD. 



friends, he was shot dead. Five balls were found 
lodg-ed in his bod-y. The pow-er of the au-thor-i- 
ties'^was laugh-ed to scorn, the press was thrown 
in-to the riv-er, and the build-ing set on fire. 

An-oth-er sad se-ries of e-vents trans-pir-ed a 
lit-tle la-ter on. The Mor-mons or " Lat-ter Day 



148 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. ' 

Saints," who have long been a thorn in the side 
of A-mer-i-ca, came in a body to Ill-in-ois in the 
years 1839 and 1840. They were re-ceiv-ed as 
suf-fer-ers in the cause of re-Hg-ion, and were per- 
mit-ted to set-tie in Han-cock Coun-ty, where they 
soon built a city which they call-ed Nau-voo. 
These strange peo-ple were made too much of, and 
had too much of their own way. They had sol- 
diers of their own which they call-ed ''The Nau- 
voo Le-gion," which was in-de-pend-ent of the 
State Mi-li-tia, and ac-count-a-ble on-ly to the 
Gov-ern-or of the State. Jo-seph Smith, the lead- 
er of the Mor-mons, who pre-tend-ed al-so to have 
vis-ions and dreams from heav-en, was a ty-rant. 
Soon troub-le sprung up a-mong these peo-ple, and 
a most shame-ful state of things fol-low-ed. Mob 
law and vi-o-lence reign-ed su-preme. On the 27th 
of June, 1845, a num-ber of des-per-ate men at 
Carth-age, near Nau-voo, broke in a-mong the 
Mor-mon lead-ers. Hi-ram Smith, Tay-lor and 
Rich-ards, three men who were on a vis-it, were 
kill-ed, and the proph-et, Jo-seph Smith, was drag- 
ged from un-der a bed and shot dead. A se-ries of 
most dis-grace-ful out-rag-es fol-low-ed, but in the 
fall of this year the Mor-mons were driv-en from 
Ill-in-ois. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. i^g 



CHAP-TER XXV. 

RAP-ID STRIDES. I 846 I 860. 

The Fif-teenth An-nu-al As-sem-bly met on 
the 7th of De-cem-ber, 1846, with Au-gus-tus C. 
French as Gov-ern-or, and Jo-seph B. Wells as 
Lieu-ten-ant-Gov-ern-or. At this time the U-ni- 
ted States was en-gag-ed in the Mex-i-can Wan 
Al-read-y the troops of the ist and 2d Ill-in-ois 
sol-diers had gone forth, at the call of du-ty, to join 
Gen-er-al Tay-lor's ar-my at San-ta Ro-sa. But 
the scorch-ing heat, the change of food, and the 
long march-es, wrought sad hav-oc in the troops 
be-fore the fight-ing be-gan. When the tug of 
w^ar came at Buen-a Vis-ta, these brave boys from 
the prair-ies gave full proof of their val-or. The 
3d and 4th Ill-in-ois troops did val-iant ser-vice in 
the bat-ties of Ver-a Cruz and Cer-ro Gor-do. 

The Ill-in-ois and Mich-i-gan Ca-nal was com- 
ple-ted, and nav-i-ga-tion be-gan in 1848. In 
1850, Con-gress grant-ed to Ill-in-ois 3,000,000 
a-cres of land for the build-ing of the Ill-in-ois Cen- 
tral rail-road. Work was be-gun in earn-est soon 
af-ter the grant was made. 



/JO HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

In 1853, Jc>-g1 a. Mat-te-son was e-lect-ed Gov- 
ern-or, and Gus-tav-us Koer-ner was made Lieu- 
ten-ant-Gov-ern-or. The build-ing of the great 
Cen-tral rail-road found work for thou-sands of 
men, and all a-long the line of the road new set- 
tle-ments sprang up. In less than four years the 
pop-u-la-tion of Ill-in-ois rose from 851,470 to 

1,711.955- 

It was while Mr. Mat-te-son was Gov-ern-or of 

Ill-in-ois, that the Free Schools, of which we are 

so just-ly proud, were es-tab-hsh-ed. The of-fice 

of Su-per-in-ten-dent of In-struc-tion was cre-a-ted, 

and Mr. Nin-i-an W. Ed-wards was the first to fill 

that hon-or-a-ble post. 

The tem-per-ance ques-tion now be-gan to stir 

the pub-lie mind. The plan of forc-ing up-on the 

peo-ple laws some-thing like the "Maine Law," 

met with great dis-fa-vor. In Chic-a-go the sa-loon 

men, who were then pay-ing $300 a year for their 

li-cen-ses, grew wild, and said if these laws were 

pass-ed they would pay no more tax-es. Some of 

the lead-ers of the sa-loon el-e-ment vi-o-la-ted ex- 

ist-ing laws, and re-fus-ing to pay the fines charg-ed 

a-gainst them, were ar-rest-ed. While their tri-als 

were in pro-gress, a mob came to their res-cue, and 

a wild ri-ot en-su-ed, in which sev-er-al were kill-ed, 

and man-y ver-y bad-ly wound-ed. So se-ri-ous was 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



151 



the state of af-fairs that the city was put un-der 

mar-tial law. 

There can be no doubt that a ver-y strong sen- 
ti-ment in fa-vor of tem-per-ance was spread-ing 




U-NI-TED STATES AR-SEN-AL AND AR-MO-RY AT ROCK IS-LAND, WITH THE 
MIS-SIS-SIP-PI IxN THE DIS-TANCE. 

a-mongst the peo-ple gen-er-al-ly. Whis-ky had 
al-read-y wrought sad ru-in in the homes of the set- 
tlers, and was threat-en-ing to blight the fair prom- 
i-ses of this grow-ing State. But it does not seem 
as if the course ta-ken by the warm ad-vo-cates of 



752 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

tem-per-ance was real-ly the wis-est. They turn- 
ed In-to bit-ter and fierce an-tag-o-nists, the men 
who made their Hv-ing by this traf-fic. Had they 
de-vo-ted them-selves more to meth-ods of kind-ly 
per-sua-sion, they would most Hke-Iy have help-ed 
on much bet-ter the cause that was so dear to their 
hearts. But the tem-per-ance ques-tion was soon 
lost sight of in the pres-ence of a grav-er dif-fi-cul- 
ty, that, like a gath-er-ing cloud, soon dark-en-ed 
all the land. 



CHAP-TER XXVI. 

THE GATH-ER-ING STORM. HON. STE-PHEN A. DOUG-LAS. 

There are some great ques-tions that will force 
their way to the front. You may mur-der the men 
who ad-vo-cate them, but you will not by any such 
means keep them long in the back-ground. Since 
the mur-der of Love-joy, the ques-tion of slav-er-y 
had be-come a com-mon theme ot con-ver-sa-tion. 
It was not Ill-in-ois on-ly, but the whole coun-try 
that was now ag-i-tat-ed, and wise men ev-er-y- 
where felt that the day of com-pro-mise was pass- 
ed for-ev-er. 

In this de-bate, Steph-en A. Doug-las took so 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



153 



im-port-ant a part that it will not be out of place 
to pre-sent a ver-y brief sketch of his ca-reer. 

Sen-a-tor Douo^-las was born at Bran-don, Ver- 



'25 

He 



com-menc-ed his ed-u-ca-tion 



mont, in 1813. 
atthe A-cad-e- 
my at Bran- 
don, and af- 
ter-wards he 
stud-i-ed at 
Can-an-dai- 
gu a , New 
York. Thence 
he re-mov-ed 
to 1 11-in-ois, 
and like many 
oth-er great 
A-mer-i-cans, 
he spent a 
brief pe-ri-od 
in teach-ing 



school. In 

1834 he was 

call-ed to the 

bar, and from 

that time his 

course was up-ward as well as on-ward. He was 

ap-point-ed to the post of Re-gis-trar of the U-ni- 




THE HON. STE-PHEN A. DOUG-LAS. 



154 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



ted States Land Of-fice, at Spring-field, in 1837; 
he be-came Sec-re-ta-ry of State in 1840; he was 
e-lect-ed a Judge of the Su-preme Court in 1841. 
He serv-ed in Con-gress in 1843, 1845, and 1847. 
He was e-lect-ed to the Sen-ate of the U-ni-ted 
States in 1847. 

In May, 1874, Sen-a-tor Doug-las had made 
him-self fa-mous by the in-tro-duc-tion of the cel-e- 
bra-ted "Squat-ter Sov-er-eign-ty" bill. This stir- 
red to the ver-y depths the friends of the Sen-a-tor, 
and the foes of slav-er-y. His friends were proud 
of his el-o-quence and a-bil-i-ty, and an-ti-slav-er-y 
men felt he was an op-po-nent not to be tri-fled 
with. Par-ty feel-ing ran so high that the life of 
Doug-las was threat-en-ed. But he was a brave 
and fear-less man, and on one oc-ca-sion he con- 
front-ed a mob of 10,000 peo-ple, and for four hours 
stood with fold-ed arms, un-daunt-ed, in spite of 
the most fran-tic hiss-ing and yell-ing. 

At the e-lec-tion of 1859, ^^e slav-er-y ques-tion 
was the one great is-sue. Steph-en A. Douglas 
and A-bra-ham Lin-coln en-ter-ed the a-re-na as 
lead-ers of the op-pos-ing par-ties, and a great con- 
test fol-low-ed, the whole his-tory of which de- 
serves the care-ful stud-y of ev-er-y pa-tri-ot-ic 
A-mer-i-can. These were might-y foe-men, and 
the cause at is-sue call-ed forth their great pow-ers 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 1^5 

to the ut-ter-most. In re-sponse to a chal-lenge 
sent to Doug-las by Lin-coln, a se-ries of pub-lie 
dis-cus-sions was ar-rang-ed, and in the au-tumn 
of 1858, sev-en of the great-est de-bates ev-er con- 
duct-ed in any land took place in Ot-ta-vva, Free- 
port, J ones-bor-o, Charles-ton, Gales-burg, Quincy 
and Al-ton. Hap-pi-ly, these o-ral de-bates have 
been pre-serv-ed in book form, and they con-sti- 
tute an im-port-ant part of the class-ics of A-mer-i- 
can his-to-ric lit-er-a-ture. 

Mr. Doug-las won the bat-tie for the Sen-a-tor- 
ship, but this con-test gave A-mer-i-ca her great 
E-nian-ci-pa-tor. 

When the war of the Re-bell-ion broke out, 
Mr. Doug-las gave Lin-coln his un-grudg-ing sup- 
port in all his ef-forts to main-tain the U-ni-on,and 
said he would stand firm-ly by him in his hour of 
per-il. 

This dis-tin-guish-ed man died at the Tre-mont 
House, Chic-a-go, on the 3d of June, 1861. Chic- 
a-go and the whole na-tion mourn-ed his loss. A 
co-los-sal mon-u-ment marks his rest-ing place on 
the south-ern side of the city of Chic-a-go, not far 
from the spot where he spent so man-y hap-py 
years, and not far from the scene of the Dear-born 
Fort mas-sa-cre. 



1^6 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS 



CHAP-TER XXVII. 

THE WAR OF THE RE-BELL-ION A-BRA-HAM LIN-COLN. 

Gov-ern-or Mat-te-son and Lieu-ten-ant Koer- 
ner were suc-ceed-ed, in 1857, by W. H. Bis-sell as 
Gov-ern-or, and John Wood as Lieu-ten-ant-Gov- 
ern-or. Bis-sell died on the i8th of March, i860, 
and Lieu-ten-ant-Gov-ern-or Wood be-came his 
suc-ces-sor for a term of ten months. 

On the 7th of Jan-u-a-ry, 1861, the Twen-ty- 
sec-ond As-sem-bly met, with Rich-ard Yates as 
Gov-ern-or, and Fran-cis A. H off-man as Lieu- 
ten-ant-Gov-ern-or. 

The times grew troublous. With the e-lec-tion 
of A-bra-ham Lin-coln to the Pres-i-den-cy, it was 
clear to all the world that the long-gath-er-ing 
storm must burst. The ques-tion of slav-er-y was 
to be set-tied once for all, and set-tied by means, 
and in a man-ner, none could fore-see. 

The ca-reer of A-bra-ham Lin-coln is full to 
the brim of sim-ple ro-mance. So much has been 
writ-ten, and said, and sung, of his great life, that 
on-ly the ver-y brief-est out-line is need-ed in these 
pa-ges. 




A-BRA-HAM LIN-COLN. 



157 



138 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



A-bra-ham Lin-coln was born in Har-din 
Coun-ty, Ken-tuck-y, on the 12th of Feb-ru-a-ry, 
1809. His pa-rents were poor. His home was 
low-ly. His moth-er, who was of a re-fin-ed and 




EAR-LY HOME OF A-BRA-HAM LTN-COLN. 



gen-tle na-ture, a-woke in the heart of her young 
son those firm re-solves and gen-tle im-pul-ses, that 
made him in af-ter years, so strong and brave, 
so firm and true. A-bra-ham was but ten years 
old when his moth-er died ; but speak-ing of her 
in the la-ter years of his life, he said : ''All that I 
am, or hope to be, I owe to my an-gel moth-er — 
bless-ings on her mem-o-ry." 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. i^g 

There were not man-y books in that old Ken- 
tuck-y home, but we may be sure they were good 
books, and the boy Lin-coln pon-der-ed them well. 
The train-ing in the log cab-in in the woods was 
per-haps, af-ter all, the best kind of train-ing, for 
the stur-dy work that lay be-fore this tall, gaunt 
son of Thom-as and Nan-cy Lin-coln. 

Lin-coln re-main-ed with his fa-ther, work-ine 
on the farm, till he was twen-ty-one years of age, 
when he came to Ill-in-ois. He spent the first 
year of his so-journ in this State in Ma-con Coun- 
ty. He then re-mov-ed to New Sa-lem, then in 
Sang-a-mon but now in Men-ard Coun-ty, where 
he was en-gag-ed as clerk in a store. 

An in-ter-est-ing sto-ry of Lin-coln's ear-ly days 
at New Sa-lem is told, well worth re-cord-ing here. 
At Cla-ry's Grove, near New Sa-lem, there was a 
group of rough, fight-ing fel-lows w4io thought they 
would ''take Lin-coln down a peg," as they said. 
Jack Arm-strong, the bul-ly of the band, was to 
have the hon-or of laying Lin-coln low. The 
crowd gath-er-ed to see the sport, but Lin-coln 
stood his ground. Jack Arm-strong was get-ting 
the worst of it, when he re-sort-ed to foul play, 
where-up-on, Lin-coln put forth all his strength, 
shook his op-po-nent like a rat, and then threw 
him o-ver his head. The crowd clos-ed in on 



i6o 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



Lin-coln, but Jack, who was at heart a man-ly fel- 
low, cried: ''Boys! Abe Lin-coln is the best fel- 
low that ever broke in-to this set-tle-ment ! H e shall 
be one of us !" 

Lin-coln and Arm-strong were good friends 




"boys, ABE LIN-COLN IS THE BEST FEL-LOW IN THIS SET-TLE-MENtT' 



ev-er af-ter, and the Cla-ry Grove boys made a 
fa-vor-ite of the strong-arm-ed wrest-ler. 

In 1830, Lin-coln was a vol-un-teer in the 
Black Hawk War, and went to the front, but nev- 
er went in-to ac-tion. In 1834, he serv-ed one 
term in the Leo^-is-la-ture of Ill-in-ois, af-ter which 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



i6i 



he de-vo-ted him-self to the stud-y of the law, and 
in 1837 he was ad-mit-ted to the bar. In 1846 he 
was e-lect-ed to Con-gress. He was not a can-di- 
date for re-e-lec-tion. He now made his home in 
Spring-field, and de-vo-ted him-self for a num-ber 




LIN-COLN S HOME IN SPRING-FIELD. 



of years to his law bus-i-ness. In 1858 came his 
con-test for the Sen-a-tor-ship in op-po-si-tion to 
Steph-en A. Doug-las. It was in this con-test that 
the fa-mous de-bates took place to which we have 
re-fer-red in a pre-vi-ous chap-ter. Since the days 
when Cic-e-ro thun-der-ed in the Ro-man for-um 



1 62 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

there has been noth-ing to corn-pare with this great 
o-ral dis-cus-sion be-tween Lincoln and Doug-las. 

On the 4th of March, 1861, A-bra-ham Lin- 
coln was in-aug-u-ra-ted Pres-i-dent of the U-ni-ted 
States. The storm had burst. The slave-la-bor 
States were in re-bell-ion under the lead of Jef-fer- 
son Da-vis. 

On the 14th of A-pril, 1861, Lin-coln is-su-ed 
a call for sol-diers to put down the re-bell-ion and 
main-tain the U-ni-on. How that call was an- 
swer-ed, and how brave a part Ill-in-ois play-ed in 
that aw-ful strife will form the theme of an-oth-er 
chap-ter. 

The his-to-ry of Lin-coln's ad-min-is-tra-tion is 
one of the most glo-ri-ous pa-ges of A-mer-i-can 
his-to-ry. Nev-er were du-ties more dif-fi-cult, 
nev-er were they more brave-ly dis-charg-ed. 

On the' 22d of Sep-tem-ber, 1862, — a great 
red let-ter day in the world's his-to-ry, — Lin-coln 
is-su-ed the Proc-la-ma-tion of E-man-ci-pa-tion. 
He rang the great bell of Free-dom, and its mu- 
sic e-cho-ed round the world ! At the sound of 
that bell slav-er-y died, and four mill-ions of slaves 
be-came free ! 

At last the dread-ful war end-ed, and at its 
close, Lin-coln ut-ter-ed his mess-age of peace, that 
should be deep grav-en in the hearts of all true 




^fet.i' 



THE LIN-COLN MON-U-MENT, AT SPRING-FIELD. 



163 



1 64 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

A-mer-1-cans : ''With mal-ice to-ward none, with 
char-i-ty for all ; with firm-ness in the right as God 
gives us to see the right, let us strive to fin-ish 
the work we are in ; to bind up the na-tion's 
wounds ; to care for him who shall have borne 
the bat-tie, and for his wid-ow and or-phans; to 
do all which we may a-chieve and cher-ish a just 
and last-ing peace a-mong our-selves and with all 
na-tions." 

Scarce-ly a month pass-ed by af-ter the ut-ter- 
ance of these im-mor-tal words, be-fore the bul-let 
of an as-sas-sin crash-ed through Lin-coln's brain ; 
and on the 14th of A-pril, 1865, all the world 
bow-ed its head in sor-row for A-mer-i-ca's mar- 
tyr-ed chief. 

A brief quo-ta-tion from the po-et Low-ell, will 
fit-ly close this sketch : 

"How beau-ti-iul to see 
Once more a shep-herd of man-kind in-deed 
Who lov-ed his charge, but nev-er lov-ed to lead; 
One whose meek flock the peo-ple joy-ed to be, 

Not lured by any cheat of birth, 
But by his clear grain-ed hu-man worth 
And brave old wis-dom of sin-cer-i-ty ! 

Our chil-dren shall be-hold his fame, 

The kind-ly, earn-est, brave, fore-see-ing man ; 

Sa-ga-cious, pa-tient, dread-ing praise — not blame — 
New birth of our new soil — The First A-mer-i-can." 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS, 165 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

WAR OF THE RE-BELL-ION GRANT AND LO-GAN. 

The War of the Re-bell-ion made large de- 
mands for all sorts of men, and all sorts of tal-ents. 
It need-ed the clear brain, and the calm, firm pur- 
pose of such men as A-bra-ham Lin-coln; and it 
need-ed the pru-dence and death-less val-or of such 
men as U-lyss-es Simp-son Grant. 

We need not won-der that the men of Ill-in-ois 
re-flect with pride up-on the fact, that in the great 
cri-sis of their coun-try's his-to-ry, this State pro- 
vi-ded the sa-ga-cious Lin-coln to guide af-fairs in 
Wash-ing-ton, and the cour-age-ous Grant, — the 
he-roof the great Re-bell-ion, — to lead the hosts to 
vic-to-ry. As long as the A-mer-i-can na-tion lasts, 
the fame of these two men will g^low with ev-er 
bright-en-ing lus-tre. 

" Be-hind their forms, the form of Time is found, 
His scythe re-vers-ed and both his pin-ions bound." 

Grant was born at Point Pleas-ant, Cler-mont 
Coun-ty, O-hi-o, on the 27th of A-pril, 1822. His 
boy-hood was not ver-y e-vent-ful. He was ed-u- 
ca-ted at West Point. In 1846 he took part in 



i66 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



the war with Mex-i-co, do-ing brave ser-vice at the 
bat-ties of Pa-lo Al-to and Re-sac-a de la Palm-a. 
In Sep-tem-ber of this year he was made a Cap-tain 

for his brav-er-y at 
Che-pul-te-pec. He 
was sta-tion-ed for a 
time at De-troit. In 
1859 he came to Ga- 
le-na and serv-ed as 
a clerk in a store, at 
the mag-nif-fi-cent 




sal-a-ry of fif-ty dol- 
lars a month ! 

When the war 
broke out, he pre-si- 
ded at the first meet- 
ing at Gales-burg 
call-ed to raise a com- 
pa-ny. He was ap- 
point-ed com-mand- 
er of the Twen-ty- 
first Ill-in-ois reg-i-ment by Gov-ern-or Yates. He 
was made a Brig-a-dier-Gen-er-al in 1 86 1 , and from 
that point he rose to the chief com-mand of the 
Ar-my of the U-ni-ted States. The his-to-ry of the 
Civ-il War is the his-to-ry of his he-ro-ic deeds. On 
the 9th of A-pril, 1865, he re-ceiv-ed the sword of 



/^, /:/ ^y^cc^^ 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. i6j 

Gen-er-al Lee, who sur-ren-der-ed at Ap-pom-a-tox 
Court House, Vir-gin-i-a. The war was end-ed, 
and Grant then ut-ter-ed the strong de-sire that will 
al-ways be as-so-ci-a-ted with his name: ''Let us 
have peace!" 

In Ju-ly, 1866, Con-gress cre-a-ted the new or- 
der of "Gen-er-al of the Ar-my," to which Grant 
was at once ap-point-ed. 

The pride of the ar-my, now be-came the i-dol 
of the peo-ple, and the high-est place the coun-try 
had to of-fer was giv-en to him. He was e-lect-ed 
Pres-i-dent of the U-ni-ted States in No-vem-ber, 
1868, and in 1872 he was e-lected to fill the of-fice 
for a sec-ond term. 

In May, 1 877, he start-ed for a grand tour round 
the world. He re-turn-ed in Sep-tem-ber, 1879. 
His jour-ney was one long pro-ces-sion, in which 
the na-tions of the earth vi-ed with each oth-er in 
of-fer-ing hon-or and hom-age fit for a king in 
state, to this qui-et, un-as-sum-ing A-mer-i-can. 

Af-ter a pro-tract-ed ill-ness, Gen-er-al Grant 
died at Mount McGreg-or, New York, on the 23d 
of Ju-ly, 1885. The gal-lant sol-dier had look-ed 
up-on death without flinch-ing a thou-sand times, 
and when his end came and death drew near, he 
bow-ed his head and died in peace. 

An-oth-er name full-y worth-y to stand side by 



i68 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



side with that of Grant, is the name of Gen-er-al 
John A. Lo-gan. He was born at Mur-phys-bor- 
ough, near Browns-ville, J ack-son Coun-ty, 1 11-in-ois, 




GEN. JOHN A. LO-GAN. 



Feb-ru-a-ry 9th, 1826. He was a war-ri-or of the 
daunt-less or-der, to whom per-il be-comes a sub- 
hme in-spi-ra-tion. It would be a ver-y hard task 
to find a more ro-man-tic sto-ry than this brave 
sol-dier's life af-fords. The mere men-tion of his 



lyo HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

name is e-nough to a-rouse the most ar-dent en- 
thu-si-asm of his old com-rades. Man-y are the 
old camp-fire tales they de-light to tell. And 
a-mongst these, no tale seems to stir their hearts 
more quick-ly than the re-cord of Lo-gan's val-or 
at the bat-tie of At-lan-ta. 

One of the most ter-ri-ble of all the bat-ties of 
the war was the bat-tie of At-lan-ta. Old sol-diers 
nev-er tire of talk-ing of that aw-ful fight, or of the 
cour-age and he-ro-ism of their gal-lant chief, John 
A. Logan — 

"Who firm-ly stood where waves of blood 
Swept o-ver square and col-umn ; 
And trac-ed his name with bay-o-net flame 
In Glo-ry's crim-son vol-ume." 

This bat-tie took place on the 2 2d of Ju-ly, 
1864. The com-mand of the ar-my de-volv-ed on 
Lo-ean. Sur-eeon Welch thus de-scribes what he 
saw : 

"Gen-er-al Lo-gan, who then took com-mand, 
on that fa-mous black stal-lion of his, be-came a 
flame of fire and fu-ry, yet keep-ing won-drous 
meth-od in his in-spir-ed mad-ness. He was ev- 
er-y-where; his horse cov-er-ed with foam, and him- 
self hat-less and be-grim-ed with dust; per-fect-ly 
com-pre-hend-ing the po-si-tion; giv-ing sharp or- 
ders to of-fi-cers as he met them; and, plant-ing 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



lyi 



him-self firm-ly in the front of flee-ing col-umns, 
with re-volv-er in hand, threat-en-nig in tones not 
to be mis-ta-ken, to fire in-to the ad-vance if they 
did not in-stant-lv halt, and form in or-der of bat- 
tie. ' He spake, and it was done.' The bat-tie 
was re-sum-ed in or-der and with fu-ry — a tem-pest 
of thun-der and fire — a haibstorm of shot and shell. 
And when night clos-ed down the bat-tie was end- 
ed, and we were mas-ters of the field. Some of 
the reg-i-ments that went in-to that aw-ful con-flict 
strong, came out with but thir-ty men, and one 
that went in 200 strong, in the morn-ing, came out 
with fif-teen men! But thou-sands of the en-em-y 
bit the dust that day, and though com-pell-ed to 
to fight in front and rear, our arms were crown-ed 
with vic-to-ry." 

It would re-quire a whole his-to-ry to re-count 
the he-ro-ic deeds of this brave son of Ill-in-ois. 
One of the most re-mark-a-ble pa-ges of that his- 
to-ry calls back the mem-o-ry of the bat-tie of Vicks- 
burg, the blow-ing up of the " Mal-a-koff," and the 
des-per-ate hand to hand fight-ing in the cra-ter. 
For his val-or in this great con-flict, he had the 
hon-orof lead-ingthe tri-um-phal en-try in-to Vicks- 
burg. He was al-so made Mil-i-ta-ry Gov-ern-or 
of the citv, and was a-dorn-ed with a med-al. 

On an-oth-er oc-ca-sion, just af-ter the close of 



7/2 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

the war, by a bold and time-ly in-ter-fer-ence, he 
sav-ed the peo-ple of Ral-eigh, N. C, from the rage 
of a vast num-ber of U-ni-on sol-diers who were 
en-camp-ed near the cit-y. The news of the as- 
sas-sin-a-tion of Lin-coln made them mad with 
bhnd, wild fu-ry. They swore they would wreak 
their ven-geance on the city of Ral-eigh, and give 
ev-er-y soul, men, wo-men and chil-dren, to the 
sword. Lo-gan, with bared head and drawn 
sword, rush-ed in front of a crowd of these fu-ri-ous 
men who had start-ed, with burn-ing brands, to do 
this dead-ly work. He threat-en-ed with in-stant 
death, the first man who should lay hands on the 
in-no-cent and un-pro-tect-ed peo-ple. The crowd 
fell back, calm-er thoughts brought bet-ter feel- 
ings, and the peo-ple of Ral-eigh were sav-ed by 
the time-ly cour-age of John A. Lo-gan. 

Af-ter the war, Lo-gan gave his time and thought 
to his law bus-i-ness, and to pol-i-tics. His zeal-ous 
po-lit-i-cal friends were con-stant-ly sug-gest-ing his 
name as a suit-a-ble can-di-date for the Pres-i-den- 
cy. His name was pre-sent-ed to the Re-pub-li- 
can Con-ven-tion of 1 884. He with-drew his name 
in fa-vor of the Hon. James G. Blaine, and was 
sub-se-quent-l^y nom-i-na-ted for the vice-Pres-i-den- 
cy. He re-ceiv-ed 779 votes, af-ter which the vote 
was made u-nan-i-mous. In the e-lec-tion of 1884 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. lyj 

the Re-pub-li-can tick-et was de-feat-ed. Lo-gan 
af-ter-wards made a gal-lant fight for the Ill-in-ois 
Sen-a-tor-ship, in which he was suc-cess-ful. 

In the month of De-cem-ber, 1886, the Gen- 
er-al was seiz-ed with an at-tack of rheu-ma-tism, 
which grew worse as the month grew old-er, yet no 
real dan-ger was ap-pre-hend-ed. But on Sun-day, 
the 26th, the daunt-less war-ri-or died. The last 
word he spoke was "Ma-ry," the name of his be- 
lov-ed and hon-or-ed wife. 



CHAP-TER XXIX. 

MEN OF ILL-IN-OIS IN THE WAR OF THE RE-BELL-ION. 

The world has nev-er seen a race of brav-er 
sol-diers, than the gal-lant ''boys" sent by Ill-in-ois 
to fight the bat-ties of the Re-bell-ion. They were 
as quick to re-spond to the call of du-ty, as they 
were brave to do and suf-fer when the time for 
fight-ing came. 

Ill-in-ois made a most hon-or-a-ble re-cord in 
the case of the Mex-i-can War, of 1846. Eight 
thou-sand, three hun-dred and sev-en-ty men of- 
fer-ed them-selves, though on-ly 3,720 could be 
ac-cept-ed. 



IY4 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

But when the war of the Re-bell-ion came, the 
dif-fi-cul-ty was not to get men who were read-y 
for the fight, but to keep back those who were too 
eag-er for the fray. Dur-ing the year 1861, the re- 
sponse to Lin-coln's call was grand-ly an-swer-ed. 
The first reg-i-ment took for its name the Sev-enth 
Ill-in-ois, be-cause of the first six num-bers hav-ing 
been giv-en to the reg-i-ments of the Mex-i-can 
War. Reg-i-ments from the Sev-enth to the Fif-ty- 
sev-enth in-clu-sive, and the Fif-ty-sev-enth, Fif-ty- 
eighth and Fif-ty-ninth, all en-ter-ed this year, 
be-side the Ill-in-ois Cav-l-ry, from the First to the 
Thir-teenth in-clu-sive. The great mus-ter-ing 
cen-tres were Camp But-ler, near Spring-field, and 
Camp Doug-las, in Chic-a-go, at the foot of Thir- 
ty-fifth street where the Doug-las Mon-u-ment 
stands. 

It was need-ful to guard Cai-ro and the south- 
ern por-tion of the State with great care from Con- 
fed-er-ate in-va-sion. Dur-ing the pro-gress of the 
War sev-er-al boats were cap-tur-ed at Cai-ro on 
their way south, load-ed with arms and am-mu-ni- 
tion. 

A brave stroke of bus-i-ness was done by Cap- 
tain Stokes and the Sev-enth Ill-in-ois reg-i-ment 
at the ver-y be-gin-ning of the War. An or-der 
was sent from Con-gress to the Au-thor-i-ties of 




SCENE IN LIN-COLN PARK, CHIC-A-GO. 



1 7 6 ' HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

Ill-in-ois to ob-tain arms from the Ar-sen-al at St. 
Lou-is. But St. Lou-is was over-run by Con-fed- 
er-ate spies; and Con-fed-er-ate troops were scat- 
ter-ed se-cret-ly all a-bout the cit-y. But Cap-tain 
Stokes, nothing daunt-ed, with 700 men raid-ed 
the Ar-sen-al, and seiz-ed 20,000 mus-kets, 500 
car-bmes and 500 pis-tols. 

Ill-in-ois put in-to her own reg-i-ments for the 
U-ni-ted States Gov-ern-ment, 256,000 men. Her 
to-tal years of ser-vice a-mount-ed to 600,000. She 
en-roll-ed men from eight-een to for-ty-five years of 
age, when Lm-coln on-lyask-ed for those from twen- 
ty to for-ty-five. Her en-roll-ments were al-ways in 
ex-cess of the de-mand. Be-side all the or-di-na-ry 
clamis, Ill-in-ois sent 20,844 ^^^^ for nine-ty or a 
hun-dred days, for whom no cred-it was ask-ed. 

There were strange, sad sights to be wit-ness-ed 
in Ill-m-ois in those days. In some coun-ties, such 
as Mon-roe, for ex-am-ple, ev-er-y a-ble bod-ied man 
went to the War; and all o-ver the State, moth-ers 
and daugh-ters went in-to the fields to raise the 
grain and keep the chil-dren to-geth-er, while the 
fa-thers and lov-ers and el-der broth-ers went to 
fight for the sa-cred flag of free-dom. 

In one case a fa-ther and four sons re-solv-ed 
that one must stay at home, so they pull-ed straws 
from a stack, and the boys man-ag-ed that the 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. lyy 

home-stay-ing straw should fall in-to the fa-ther's 
hand. So the boys went and the fa-ther stay-ed 
at home. But three days la-ter, the fa-ther went 
in-to camp, say-ing, that moth-er and the girls 
''guess-ed they could get the crops in with-out 
him," and he'd come to fight a-long-side the boys. 
Man-y church-es sent ev-er-y one of their male 
mem-bers to the War. Where the ''boys" of 111- 
in-ois went, they went to win. The great-est vic- 
to-ries were all fought ~in the West. When all 
look-ed dark, the men of Ill-in-ois were march-ing 
down the riv-er, and di-vid-ing the sol-id pow-er of 
the Con-fed-er-a-cy. 

When Sher-man march-ed to the Sea, he took 
with him for-ty-five reg-i-ments of Ill-in-ois in-fant- 
ry, three com-pa-nies of ar-til-ler-y, and one com- 
pa-ny of cav-al-ry. To all rumors of Sher-man's 
de-feat, the trust-ful Lin-coln said: 

''No! It is im-pos-si-ble ; there is a might-y 
sight of fight in 100,000 Western Men!" 

And so it prov-ed. For the men of Ill-in-ois 
brought home 300 bat-tie flags; and the first flag 
that was un-fold-ed to the breeze at Rich-mond, 
when the War was end-ed, was a ban-ner from 
Ill-in-ois! 



lyS HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



CHAP-TER XXX. 

CHIC-A-GO THE GREAT MAR-VEL OF MOD-ERN CIT-IES. 

It would re-quire a vol-ume man-y times the 
size of this ht-tle book to sketch in mere out-hne 
the won-der-ful his-to-ry of the cit-y of Chic-a-go. 
It is eas-y to see, there-fore, that with the small 
:space at our com-mand, we can on-ly give at best 
a bird's-eye view of this ro-man-tic sto-ry of cit-y 
life. There is no ex-trav-a-gance in speak-ing of 
Chic-a-go as the great-est mar-vel of the Prair-ie 
State. 

An en-thu-si-as-tic writ-er, not him-self a na-tive 
of Chic-a-go, or of Ill-in-ois, says: 

''This mys-te-ri-ous, ma-jes-tic, might-y cit-y, 
born first of wa-ter and next of fire ; sown in weak- 
ness, and rais-ed in pow-er; plant-ed a-mong the 
wil-lows of the marsh, sleep-ing on the bo-som of 
the prair-ie, and rock-ed on the wa-ters of the lake ; 
with schools e-clips-ing Al-ex-an-dria and Ath-ens ; 
with lib-er-ties great-er than those of the old re-pub- 
lics, with a he-ro-ism e-qual to that of Carth-age, 
and a sanc-ti-ty sec-ond on-ly to that of Je-ru-sa- 
lem ; — set your thoughts on all this, — lift-ed in-to 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



lyg 



the eyes of all men by the mir-a-cle of its growth, 
il-lu-min-a-ted by the flame of its fall, and trans-fig- 
ur-ed by the di-vin-i-ty of its res-ur-rec-tion, — and 
you will feel as I do, the ut-ter im-pos-si-bil-i-ty 
of com-pass-ing this sub-ject as it de-serves." 

The first set-tier in Chic-a-go is said to have 
been Jean Bap-tis-te Pointe au Sa-ble, a mu-latt-o 
from the West In-dies, who came and be-gan to 
trade with the In-dians in 1796. John Kin-zie 
be-came his suc-cess-or in 1804, when Fort Dear- 
born was built. From that time till a-bout the 
time of the Black Hawk War in 1832, Chic-a-go 
was on-ly atrad-ing post. And there are those liv- 
ing to-day who can re-call some of the quaint-est 
and most prim-i-tive scenes in the ver-y streets 
where now a com-merce, em-brac-ing in its deal-ings 
the whole civ-il-iz-ed world, sways its mag-ic pow-er. 

Man-y strange sights were seen in these ear-ly 
Chic-a-go days, that if seen now, would cre-ate 
quite a sen-sa-tion. For ex-am-ple: a com-pa-ny 
of wan-der-ing In-dians would come a-long, to dis- 
pose of their bead-work and oth-er pro-ducts, and 
to buy their win-ter stores. A large bas-ket 
on one arm, and a fair-siz-ed chub-by pap-poose in 
the oth-er, was a heavy bur-den for the In-dian 
moth-er, who would some-times lean her dus-ky 
ba-by a-gainst the wall, and some-times, when the 



i8o HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

dogs came a-long and lick-ed the face of the help- 
less child, she would hang her lit-tle trea-sure to 
the sad-die horns of the near-est po-ny. Then in 
sheer mis-chief the mer-ry young fel-lows of the 
lit-tle trad-ing post, would un-fast-en the po-ny and 
set him trot-ting, just for the fun of see-ing the half 
fran-tic squaw rush wild-ly to the res-cue of her 
child. Some times these prac-ti-cal jokes would 
end in a quar-rel, es-pe-cial-Iy if the pap-poose was 
in-jur-ed in any way, but gen-er-al-ly the po-ny was 
caught be-fore an-y harm was done. 

Of course, Chic-a-go owes much to its ge-o- 
graph-i-cal po-si-tion. The Chic-a-go riv-er, of 
those ear-ly days, reach-ed back in-to the prair-ie 
with-in a ver-y short dis-tance of the Des Plaines, 
with which it has since been u-ni-ted, leav-ing on-ly 
a short port-age to be made in a jour-ney from the 
far east-ern lakes to the mouth of the Mis-sis-sip-pi. 
And la-ter, when the North-west took on its mar- 
vel-ous de-vel-op-ment, in-vi-ting the great rail-ways 
of the East in-to har-vest fields al-read-y ripe, there 
was no route a-vail-a-ble for them but that a-round 
Lake Mich-i-gan, and through the strug-gling 
young town just be-yond the foot of the lake But 
the ear-ly res-i-dents of the place nev-er dream-ed 
that it would at-tain com-mer-cial prom-i-nence, 
and the time is still with-in mem-o-ry, when the 



1 




THE LIT-TLE PAP-POOSE IN DAN-GER. 



i82 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

in-hab-i-tants fear-ed the ru-in-a-tion of their town 
by ca-nals and rail-ways! To-day, how-ev-er, it is 
the cen-tre of a full third of the rail-way mile-age 
of the U-ni-ted States, and the most rap-id-ly pros- 
per-ing cit-y on the con-ti-nent. 

The cease-less growth of Chic-a-go is best seen 
by a glance at the fol-low-ing set of fig-ures. The 
in-crease from 70 in 1830, to 800,000 in 1888, has 
come a-bout in this or-der: 

1830, - - - . - 70 

1840, - - - - 4,853 

1850, - - - - 29,963 

i860, - - - - 1 12,172 

1870, - - - - 298,907 
1880, - . - - 503,185 

1888, - - - - 800,000 

Who can tell to what great di-men-sions this 
cit-y may yet spread! At this rate of growth, it 
is al-most cer-tain that when the Twen-ti-eth 
Cen-tu-ry dawns up-on the world, Chic-a-go will 
pos-sess more than a mill-ion in-hab-it-ants. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 183 



CHAP-TER XXXI. 

THE GREAT FIRE OF CHIC-A-GO. 

Who has not heard of the Great Fire of Chic- 
a-go? All the world stood in ter-ror and a-maze- 
ment when the ti-dings of that aw-ful scourge were 
told from land to land. Who shall un-der-take 
to tell that aw-ful sto-ry ? The sto-ry nev-er can 
be per-fect-ly told. For the sketch that fol-lows 
we are great-ly in-debt-ed to Dres-bach's "His-to- 
ry of lU-in-ois," and to the news-pa-per re-ports 
that have been pre-serv-ed : 

Fig-ures give but a faint i-dea of this tre-men- 
dous ca-lam-i-ty. More than two hun-dred per- 
sons lost their lives in this aw-ful trag-e-dy. 
Near-ly one hun-dred thou-sand per-sons found 
them-selves with-out eith-er homes or the means 
of ob-tain-ing homes, while no less than 17,450 
build-ings, man-y of them ex-treme-ly val-u-a-ble, 
were de-stroy-ed. The total loss was fig-ur-ed at. 
$190,000,000, up-on which the in-sur-ance com-pa- 
nies were on-ly a-ble to pay $44,000,000. Thus, 
the val-ue of $146,000,000 was melt-ed out of ex- 
ist-ence. The burned a-rea was a to-tal of three 



i84 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

and a third square miles, and the des-o-Ia-tion was 
so com-plete, that men stood a-round and said, 
*'Chic-a-go is de-stroy-ed ; there is no fu-ture for 
the cit-y at alL" 

On the e-ven-ing of Sun-day, Oc-to-ber 8, 1871, 
a wo-man, hav-ing to milk at a late hour, took a 
lamp to the sta-ble with her. By some mis-hap — 
the sto-ry goes — the cow kick-ed, the lamp was 
over-turn-ed ; the hay caught fire, then the sta-ble; 
the blaze spread to ad-join-ing sta-bles, sheds and 
hous-es, kind-ling one of the great-est con-fla-gra- 
tions re-cord-ed m any cit-y's his-to-ry. A gale 
was blow-ing from the south-west; there had been 
a prev-a-lent drouth for some time, and the sec-tion 
from which the fire had o-rig-i-na-ted was fiU-ed 
with light frame struc-tures, all of which were fa- 
vor-a-ble for a rap-id ad-vance of the flames. The 
start-ing point was in the vi-cin-i-ty of DeKo-ven 
and Jef-fer-son streets, in the West Di-vis-ion, and 
in the south-west quar-ter of the cit-y, the gen-er- 
al ad-vance be-ing in a north-east-er-ly di-rec-tion. 
The flames leap-ed a-cross the riv-er a-bout mid- 
night. The fire then ad-vanc-ed in a ma-jes-tic 
col-umn, flank-ed on the right and on the left by 
less-er col-umns a lit-tle in the rear. 

The Cham-ber of Com-merce was burn-ed 
a-bout I o'clock and the Court House fol-low-ed 




/■^i 






^■'i/i 



,11 i'..:,.U..kt -^7:^ 



r 



i86 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



short-ly af-ter. Pris-on-ers con-fin-ed in the base- 
ment of the lat-ter, hav-ing been freed to save 
their hves, show-ed their grat-i-ude — or de-prav-ed 
na-tures — by plun-der-ing a jew-el-ry store near by. 
The great bell in the dome went down, sound-ing 
its own death knell as it fell, and at a-bout the 




MAP OF THE BURNT DIS-TRICT OF CHIC-A-GO. 

same hour, 3 o'clock, the large gas-o-me-ter ex- 
plod-ed with ter-rif-ic vi-o-lence. The Times and 
Trib-une build-ings, Cros-by's mag-ni-fi-cent Op- 
e-ra House, Sher-man, Tre-mont and Palm-er 
Ho-tels, U-ni-on Bank, Mer-chants' In-sur-ance 
Build-ing, of-fice of the West-ern U-ni-on Tel-e- 
graph, Post-of-fice, McVick-er's The-a-tre, and 



y 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 187 

nu-mer-ous oth-er ed-i-fi-ces crum-bled be-fore the 
fur-nace heat of ad-vanc-ing flames. Not less than 
$2,000,000 worth of treas-ure was de-stroy-ed in 
the post-of-fice vaults. 

While the peo-ple in the North Di-vi-sion were 
gaz-ing up-on the burn-ing dome of the Court 
House, ex-press-ing sym-pa-thy for the pit-i-a-ble 
con-di-tion of the wretch-ed and their home-less 
friends, they were sud-den-ly a-wa-ken-ed to a sense 
of their own per-il — the fire, by un-ac-count-a-ble 
means, reach-ed the en-gine house of the wa-ter- 
works, thus cut-ting off that means of fight-ing the 
fire, and hem-ming in a vast re-gion, with fire on 
the south. The flames swept on till they spent 
them-selves on the north ; were stop-ped by the 
beach along the lake, and were ar-rest-ed from go- 
ing far-ther south-ward by blow-ing up build-ings. 
It is said this work was su-per-in-tend-ed by Gen- 
er-al Sher-i-dan. On-ly two build-ings, — Lind's 
block, a brick ed-i-fice with i-ron shut-ters, stand- 
ing by it-self in the South Di-vi-sion, and the res-i- 
dence of Mah-lon Og-den, in the North Di-vi-sion, 
were left in all the scouro;-ed re-g^ion. 

No lan-guage is ad-e-quate to de-scribe the hor- 
rors and mis-er-y of the night of the 8th and the 
fol-low-ing day. A hun-dred thou-sand peo-ple 
were driv-en from their homes to es-cape, if pos-si- 



i88 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

ble, the mad, seeth-ing fire, on-ly to be Im-pe-ded 
by the e-qual-ly mad and fran-tic throng. In the 
vi-cin-i-ty ot Gris-wold, Quin-cy, Jack-son and 
Wells streets, where pov-er-ty, mis-er-y and vice 
were heap-ed to-geth-er in squal-id, rick-et-y hous-es, 
the scene was ap-pall-ing. Peo-ple rush-ing half 
clad through the streets; curs-es, pray-ers, shouts, 
screams, and rude mer-ri-ment, blend-ing their 
weird sounds; stores and sa-loons were thrown 
o-pen by own-ers, or bro-ken in-to by thieves. H ere 
they fought over spoils un-til driv-en on-ward by 
ap-proach-ing fire, then rush-ed in-to a sway-ing 
crowd craz-ed with ex-cite-ment or li-quor, on-ly to 
in-crease the hor-ror of the sur-round-mgs. 

The low-est fig-ure at which a hack or con-vey- 
ance could be ob-tain-ed was $io, and reach-ing as 
high as $50. It not un-fre-quent-ly hap-pen-ed, 
e-ven at the last price, a driv-er would start with a 
load of ar-ti-cles, drive a short dis-tance, then stop 
and in-crease the price, or de-mand im-me-di-ate 
pay-ment. If the de-mand was not com-pli-ed 
with, off went the goods in-to the street to be pil- 
lag-ed by ''roughs," tram-pled un-der foot, or con- 
sum-ed by the flames. Oc-ca-sion-al-ly the own-er 
brought the heart-less dri-ver to a sense of his 
du-ty by dis-play-ing a re-volv-er. E.I. Tink-man, 
cash-ier of one of the banks, paid an ex-press-man 




00 



I go HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. ' 

$i,ooo for con-vey-ing a box, con-taln-ing val-u-a- 
bles worth $600,000, from its vault to a de-pot in 
the West Di-vi-sion. No law, no or-der, no au- 
thor-i-ty, seem-ed to ex-ist; the po-lice were pow- 
er-less, and ter-ror, de-struc-tion, av-a-rice and con- 
fu-sion, reign-ed su-preme. 

The bridg-es were throng-ed with ev-er-y va-ri- 
e-ty of ve-hi-cle and foot pas-sen-ger, all bear-ing 
heav-y loads. An un-der-ta-ker, with his em-ploy- 
ees, was no-tic-ed, each car-ry-ing a cof-fin ; next, 
an I-rish wo-man trudg-ing a-long, lead-ing a goat 
by one hand, while with the other she clutch-ed a 
roll of silk. Oc-ca-sion-al-ly an or-der would be 
giv-en for a bridge to be turn-ed for the pass-age 
of a ves-sel seek-ing cool-er climes, when a cry of 
in-dig-na-tion or despair would go up from the 
anx-i-ous mul-ti-tude. 

A nar-row stretch of shore, bor-der-ing up-on a 
por-tion of the lake, pro-tect-ed by a break-wa-ter, 
ap-pa-rent-ly of-fer-ed a place of re-fuge. To this 
man-y flock-ed, car-ry-ing with them ar-ti-cles of 
ev-er-y de-scrip-tion, sav-ed in their hur-ri-ed de- 
par-ture from burn-ing homes. Here, a frail wo- 
man car-ry-ing a sew-ing ma-chine; there, two 
dauo^h-ters bear-iuQ^ an in-val-id and faint-ino^ moth- 
er; not far be-yond, a girl jeal-ous-ly guard-ing her 
.small bun-die, when a ruf-fi-an knocks her down 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



igi 



and se-cures the prize. As the fire ap-proach-es 
near-er, the crowd upon this nar-row strip of land 
is forc-ed in-to the wa-ter, where, by con-stant-ly 
drench-ing them-selves, they are en-a-bled to with- 




POST OF-FICE, CHIC-A-GO. 



stand the fierce heat. Many moth-ers thus stood 
for hours and sup-port-ed a child a-bove wa-ter. 

A-long the san-dy beach to the north-ward 
thou-sancls of rich and poor — or all a-like poor — 
took re-fuge in a sim-i-lar man-ner. Some were 
drown-ed by be-ing crowd-ed be-yond their depth. 
The old cem-e-ter-y, once a part of Lin-coln Park, 
al-so of-fer-ed a re-treat for at least 30,000 peo-ple, 



igz 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



who hud-dled to-geth-er in this cit-y of the dead. 
Chil-dren were there cry-ing forpar-enis, hus-bands 
dis-tract-ed over the loss of a wife, broth-ers hunt- 
ing sis-ters or pa-rents chil-dren. Here a group 
of girls weep-ing for their moth-er who was too ill 
to be mov-ed and had to be a-ban-don-ed ; there a 
la-dy a-lone with a bun-die of fine dress-es thrown 
o-ver her arm ; close by, a bank-er with bow-ed 
head sit-ting on a grave look-ing in-to a fry-ing- 
pan he had un-con-scious-ly sav-ed from de-struc- 
tion ; a man with an ice pitch-er de-clar-ed it was 
all he pos-sess-ed in the world, while scores of 
men, wo-men and chil-dren were care-ful-ly shield- 
ing some pet ca-na-ry, par-rot or poo-dle. 

The prair-ie west of the cit-y was al-so throng- 
ed by a home-less mul-ti-tude, while man-y took 
shelter with friends in por-tions not de-stroy-ed. 
At 2 o'clock, Tues-day morn-ing, came a wel-come 
rain. It add-ed to the mis-er-y for the time, yet 
it was hail-ed with joy. 



CHAP-TER XXXII. 

CHIC-A-GO AF-TER THE FIRE. 

If it is not eas-y to find words that will fit-ly 
de-scribe the terrors and ru-in of the Great Fire 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



193 



of Chic-a-go, neith-er is it eas-y to tell of the grand 
re-sponse made by the whole coun-try, and, in-deed, 
bv the whole civ-il-iz-ed world, to these suf-fer-ers 
in the hour of their sore dis-tress. 

The gen-er-ous giv-mg that mark-ed that month 
of Oc-to-ber, 1871, forms a page of mod-ern his- 




SCENE ON THE CHIC-A-GO RIVER. 



to-ry of which hu-man-i-ty may well be proud, and 
for which Chic-a-go will al-ways be grate-ful. The 
fol-low-ing par-a-graph from a Chic-a-go pa-per of 
Oc-to-ber 13th, shows what the peo-ple of the sad 
cit-y felt : 

''The CnRisTrLiKE Char-i-ty. — The re-sponse 



ig^ HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

of the peo-ple of the U-ni-ted States to the ap-pall- 
ing ca-lam-i-ty which has o-ver-ta-ken our cit-y, has 
no par-al-lel in the his-to-ry of the world since 
Christ died for our sins. We can-not re-turn our 
thanks for their lov-ing kind-ness. Words fal-ter 
on our Hps. On-ly our stream-ing eyes can tell 
how deep-ly we feel their good-ness." 

On Oc-to-ber 9th, the Cit-y Coun-cil of Pitts- 
burg pledg-ed $100,000 to the Chic-a-go suf-fer- 
ers. St. Lou-is, Cin-cin-nat-i and other cit-ies had 
al-read-y done the same. At an in-for-mal meet- 
ing in Pitts-burg, on Tues-day, $20,000 was paid 
o-ver on the spot by cit-i-zens, and be-fore Wed- 
nes-day the a-mount had been rais-ed to $100,000. 
AtLou-is-ville,pri-vate sub-scrip-tions a-mount-ing 
to near-ly $100,000 were rais-ed in ten hours. On 
Mon-day, Oc-to-ber 9th, be-fore the fire had ceas-ed 
burn-ing, Ter-re Haute, In-di-an-a, had a train 
load of pro-vi-sions en-route to the scene of suf-fer- 
ing. Sev-er-al car loads of pro-vi-sions were ship- 
ped from In-dian-ap-o-lis on the same e-ven-ing, 
and $10,000 in cash paid o-ver by the cit-i-zens 
for een-er-al re-lief. Thir-ty thou-sand dol-lars 
more was sub-scrib-ed. 

Long be-fore noon on Oc-to-ber 9th, while the 
fire was still burn-ing, the peo-ple of Cai-ro, Ill-in- 
ois, were load-ing a re-lief train. Hal-li-day 



1^6 JiIsrORY OF ILLINOIS. 

Broth-ers, gave loo bar-rels of flour, and the cit-I- 
zens fill-ed sev-er-al cars with cook-ed food. This 
train reach-ed Chic-a-go ear-ly on Tues-day morn- 
ing, when its ^con-tents were most ur-gent-ly need- 
ed. Car loads from Nash-ville and Mem-phis 
were sent for-ward. On one of the cars was the 
in-scrip-tion — 

p. — ^ 

I NO NORTH, NO SOUTH, | 

\ WHEN OUR FEL-LOW MEN 1 • 

I ARE IN DIS-TRESS. | ' 

li ^ 

Kan-sas Cit-y was rais-ing sub-scrip-tions be- ■ 

fore the fire reach-ed Lin-coln Park; so were the I 

peo-ple of Os-we-go, New York; Leav-en-worth, 
Kan-sas ; Bos-ton, Fort Wayne, To-le-do, Balti- 
more, Al-ba-ny ; Ev-ans-ville, In-di-an-a; Wheel- 
ing, West Vir-gin-i-a; Co-lum-bus, O-hi-o; Wash- 
ing-ton, D.C.; Pe-o-ri-a, Ill-in-ois; and man-yoth-er 
points. 

On the I ith of Oc-to-ber, twen-ty-two car loads 
of pro-vi-sions reach-ed Chic-a-go from St. Lou-is, 
and on the next day 10,000 blan-kets came from 
that gen-er-ous cit-y. 

A Chic-a-go Re-lief and Aid So-ci-e-ty was at 
once or-gan-iz-ed, and be-fore the sun set on the 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 797 

1 8th of No-vem-ber — on-ly six brief weeks — the 
great sum of $2,508,810.39, had been con-trib-u- 
ted to the cit-y that sat in dark-ness, and al-most 
in de-spair, from the States and Ter-ri-to-ries of 
the U-ni-on. 



CHAP-TER XXXIII. 

CHIC-A-GO RE-BUILT. 

If there was, as has of-ten been said, a cer-tain 
ro-mance of sor-row and de-spair in the great fire 
that laid waste the fair cit-y of the Lake, there was 
al-so a grand ro-mance of hope and cour-age, in the 
way in which the men of Chic-a-go rose from the 
ash-es of their homes and the rel-ics of their for- 
tunes, and pluck-ed from the ver-y heart of dis-as- 
ter, the for-tunes of comx-ing days. 

The ill winds of that sad Oc-to-ber blew ben-e- 
dic-tions in dis-guise. The cit-y of wood soon be- 
came a cit-y of stone and i-ron. The fire taught 
some wise and last-ing les-sons. The ''Gar-den 
Cit-y" of twen-ty years a-go has be-come a cit-y of 
Pal-a-ces and Tem-ples, com-par-ing most fa-vor-a> 
bly with an-y cit-ies of the Old World or of the 
^Vw. Its homesof cost-ly splen-dor; its beau-ti-ful 



ig8 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



tem-ples ; its pal-a-ces of com-merce, of llt-er-a-ture 
and art, make Chic-a-go the pride of its cit-i-zens, 
and the won-der and ad-mi-ra-tion of vis-it-ors from 
oth-er lands. 

The parks and bou-le-vards that gir-dle the 

cit-y, are scenes of 



grow-ing beau-ty, 
con-trib-u-ting at 
once to the el-e-va- 
tion of the taste, 
and to the good 
health of the peo- 
ple. The parks 
pro-per, in -elude 
1,879 3,-cres of 
land, and are 
main-tain-ed at an 
al-most fab-u-lous 
cost. No cit-y in 
the mod-ern world 
has so man-y ad- 
van-ta-ges of this 
kind to boast of. 
The com-mer-cial cen-tre of the cit-y is the new 
Board of Trade Build-ing, that cross-es La Salle 
street, near Jack-son. The lof-ty tow-er ris-es 200 
feet, and com-mands a per-fect view of the cit-y. 




■'^^^u:rz, 



GAR-FIELD PARK, CHIC-A-GO. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



igg 



The main hall is 175 x 155 feet, and 80 feet high. 
The to-tal cost of this mag-nif-i-cent build-ing was 
a-bout $1,700,000. 

Chic-a-go con-tains a great-er num-ber of res-i- 
dent ar-tists than 
any oth-er West- 
ern cit-y — some 
two hun-dred — 
and there are in 
the cit-y a num-ber 
of ver-y fine pic- 
tures; but un-til 
r e-c e n t-1 y the 
cause of art ed-u- 
ca-tion has on-ly 
d to 
a-long 
since the fire. 
Now, at last, how- 
ev-er, the Art In- 
sti-tute has ob- 
tain-ed a foot-hold 
which prom-i-ses 
sta-bil-i-ty, in the 
new A-cad-e-my of Fine Arts, a hand-some brown- 
stone build-mgat Mich-i-gan Av-e-nue Bou-le-vard 
and Van Bur-en street. The I n-sti-tute is at-tend-ed 



m a n-ag-e 
strug-gle 




BOARD OF TRADE, CHIC-A-GO. 



200 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



dur-ing the year by a-bout four hun-dred pu-pils, 
and is self-sup-port-ing. Ex-hi-bi-tions are held 



'/•> 




A-CAD-EM-Y OF FINE ARTS, CHIC-A-GO. 



here fre-quent-ly, and there is a ver-y cred-it-a-ble 
nu-cleus of a per-ma-nent col-lec-tion. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS, 



2or 



The Med-i-cal Col-leg-es are sev-en in num-ber, 
the most no-ta-ble be-ing the Col-lege of Phy-si- 
cians and Sur-o-eons, and the Rush Med-i-cal Col- 




RUSH MED-I-CAL COL-LEGE, CHIC-A-GO. 

lege, both ad-joln-ing Cook Coun-ty Hos-pi-taL 
Rush Med-i-cal Col-lege was built in 1875. This 
Col-lege is the fa-vor-ite re-sort of med-i-cal stu- 
dents of the West. The thor-ough-ness of the 
med-i-cal ed-u-ca-tion here giv-en has made Rush 
Col-lege fa-mous through the whole State, and far 
be-yond. 



202 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



The Church-es of Chic-a-go are a-mongst the 
most im-pos-ing church build-ings of the land. 
To e-nu-mer-ate them on-ly, would re-quire more 
space than we have at our com-mand. 

The Ex-po-si-tion Build-ing, on the Lake 
Front, Is an-oth-er im-pos-ing struc-ture that has, 




EX-PO-SI-TION r.UILD-ING, CHIC-A-GO. 



in the course of a few years, be-come his-to-ric. 
Here the Great Na-tion-al Con-ven-tions were held 
on sev-er-al im-por-tant oc-ca-sions. It is ca-pa- 
ble of hold-ing sev-en or eight thou-sand peo-ple, 
and of late years the cel-e-bra-ted Sum-mer E-ven- 
ing Con-certs, led by Mr. The-o-dore Thom-as, 
have been held in this vast hall. Once a year a 
grand ex-hi-bi-tion of the pro-ducts of this and 
oth-er States has been held with-in its walls. 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 203 



CHAP-TER XXXIV. 

RE-CENT E-VENTS. 

The Hon. John M. Pal-mer, who was Gov- 
ern-or of Ill-in-ois dur-ing the e-vent-ful pe-ri-od of 
the Chic-a-go fire, was suc-ceed-ed, in 1873, by 
Rich-ard J. O-gles-by as Gov-ern-or, and John L. 
Bev-er-idge as Lieu-ten-ant-Gov-ern-or. 

At the Grand Cen-ten-ni-al Ex-po-si-tion in 
Phil-a-del-phi-a, in 1876, the State of Ill-in-ois 
made a spe-ci-al-ly fine dis-play in the ag-ri-cul-tu- 
ral de-part-ment, for which a beau-ti-ful med-al was 
a-ward-ed. 

In 1877, La-bor dif-fi-cul-ties a-rose through- 
out the U-ni-ted States. Bus-i-ness was block-ed 
by strikes. At East St. Lou-is a mob of 10,000 
men threat-en-ed the peace and safe-ty of the cit-y. 
Chic-a-go was plac-ed in charge of Gen-er-al Du-cat. 
Be-fore these trou-bles end-ed, they had cost the 
State $87,000. 

On the 26th of Sep-tem-ber, 1881, Ill-in-ois, 
and Chic-a-go in par-tic-u-lar, took part in the 
Na-tion-al fu-ner-al of Gen-er-al Gar-field. 

The Hon. Shel-by M. Cul-lom was e-Iect-ed 



204 



HISIORY OF ILLINOIS. 



Gov-ern-or in 1881, with John M. Ham-il-ton as 
Lieu-ten-ant-Gov-ern-or. In Jan-u-a-ry, 1883, 
Gov-ern-or Cul-lom was e-lect-ed to fill a va-can-cy 
in the U-ni-ted States Sen-ate. Lieu-ten-ant-Gov- 
ern-or Ham-il-ton be-came Gov-ern-or dur-ing the 
rest of the term. 

In 1885, Rich-ard J. O-gles-by, the pres-ent 
Gov-ern-or, en-ter-ed on his third .^ 
term of of-fice, with John C. Smith 
as Lieu-ten-ant-Gov-ern-or. v" ^ 

A| ■ ^ 




1 



WASH-ING-TON PARK CLUB HOUSE, CHIC-A-GO. 



In the early part of 1886, more la-bor trou-bles 
dis-turb-ed the peace of Ill-in-ois. A se-cret or- 



2o6 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

gan-i-za-tion of An-arch-ists stir-red up the feel- 
ings of the dis-sat-is-fied class-es. At one of their 
most vi-o-lent meet-ings, as-sem-bled on the 5 th of 
May on Hay-mar-ket Square, Chic-a-go, a dyn-a- 
mite bomb was thrown, and re-volv-ers fired, in 
re-ply to the or-ders of the po-lice to dis-perse. 
One po-lice-man was kill-ed out-right, six-ty were 
wound-ed, of whom six died la-ter. Af-ter a pro- 
tract-ed tri-al, Au-gust Spies, A-dolph Fisch-er, 
A. R. Par-sons, and George En-gel, the lead-ers 
of this or-gan-i-za-tion, were hang-ed at the Cook 
Coun-ty jail, Chic-a-go, on the i ith of No-vem-ber, 
1887. One of their num-ber, Lou-is Lingg, com- 
mit-ted su-i-cide in the jail the day be-fore. Mi- 
chael Schwab and Sam-u-el Field-en were sent to 
the State Pris-on for life. 

On the 22d of Oc-to-ber, 1887, a mag-nif-i-cent 
mon-u-ment to the mem-o-ry of A-bra-ham Lin- 
coln, — pro-vi-ded for in the will of the late Eli 
Bates, one of the most no-ta-ble of the ear-ly cit-i- 
zens of Chic-a-go, — was un-veil-ed in Lin-coln 
Park, Chic-a-go, by his grand-son, "Lit-tle Abe," 
son of the Hon. Rob-ert T. Lin-coln. Af-ter a 
speech by Leon-arcl Swett, one of Lin-coln's old-est 
friends, May-or Roche made the fol-low-ing im- 
press-ive re-marks: " Here, in the me-trop-o-lis of 
the great State that nur-tur-ed him from boy-hood 



HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 



20J 



to ri-pen-ed man-hood, and saw him by the na- 
tion's suf-frage, con-se-cra-ted to lead-er-ship, and 
in-vest-ed with more than king-ly pow-er; here in 
the beau-ti-ful park, com-mem-o-ra-ting his name, 
by the wa-tersof this great inland sea, it is fit-ting 
that we raise a mon-u-ment to his mem-o-ry, where 
fu-ture gen-er-a-tions may come and see the Hke- 
ness of the he-ro who died lor lib-er-ty." At this 
point, " Lit-tle Abe" step-ped to the base of the 
stat-ue, and un-loos-ing the string that held the 
A-mer-i-can col-ors, re-veal-ed the rug-ged but 
state-ly form of Lin-coln to the gaze of ap-plaud- 
ine thou-sands. An il-lus-tra-tion of that life-like 
stat-ue forms the fron-tis-piece to this his-to-ry. 

On this same day, Sat-ur-day, Oc-to-ber the 
2 2d, 1887, and while yet the can-non were boom- 
ing in honor of Lin-coln, the Hon. E-li-hu B. 
Wash-burne, one of the most dis-tin-guish-ed men 
of his coun-try and his age, died in Chic-a-go at 
the res-i-dence of his son. Hemp-stead Wash-burne. 
Mr. Wash-burne was the friend of Lin-coln and 
Grant all through the dark days of the War. He 
will, how-ev-er, be best re-mem-ber-ed as U-m-ted 
States Min-is-ter to France dur-ing the try-ing 
pe-ri-od of the Fran-co-Ger-man War. How suc- 
cess-ful-ly he con-duct-ed the del-i-cate du-ties of 
his of-fice we may judge, from the fact, that he so 



2o8 HISTORY OF ILLINOIS. 

won the con-fi-dence of men of all par-ties, that at 
their re-quest, and with the joint con-sent of the 
Gov-ern-ments at Wash-ing-ton and at Par-is, the 
Ger-mans and oth-er for-eign-ers then in Par-is, 
plac-ed them-selves under his of-fi-cial care. And 
when his term of of-fice end-ed, he had won the 
u-ni-ver-sal ad-mi-ra-tion of Eu-rope, and made the 
name of A-mer-i-can an hon-or-ed name in all the 
courts of the Old World. Mr. Wash-burne has 
left two port-ly vol-umes de-tail-ing the sto-ry of 
these e-vent-ful days, which form a grand con-tri- 
bu-tion to mod-ern his-to-ric lit-er-a-ture. 

On Tues-day, Oc-to-ber the i6th, 1888, John 
Went-worth, one of the old-est in-hab-i-tants of 
Chic-a-go, and one of the best known men in the 
State, died at the Sher-man House, Chic-a-go, in 
the 74th year of his age. Mr. Went-worth was a 
man of great stat-ure, and was on that ac-count 
known as "Long John." He was al-so a man of 
rug-ged, men-tal char-ac-ter. He was a pro-duct 
of the pi-o-neer days in which he play-ed a vig-or- 
ous part. He a-mass-ed a large for-tune in real 
es-tate, and was one of Chic-a-go's mill-ion-aires. 
He was twice may-or of Chic-a-go, and serv-ed 
twelve years as mem-ber of Con-gress. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



